In Marcus v. Hanover Ins. Co., Inc., 740 So.2d 603 (La.1999), the Louisiana Supreme Court held that a “business use exclusion” in a personal automobile liability policy which excludes coverage for damages resulting from the operation of “your insured car, in any business other than an auto business,” is against…
Using the duty/risk analysis, it must be determined whether the insured’s conduct of which the plaintiff complains is a legal cause of the accident. If so, then it must be determined whether the insured’s conduct arose out of the “use” of an automobile. In order for the insured’s conduct to…
Liability insurance policy language requiring “permission” by the owner to use a vehicle imposes a different standard than a policy requiring only a “reasonable belief” by the operator that he or she had permission of the owner to use the vehicle. When the insurance policy requires permission by the owner,…
Black’s Law Dictionary defines INSURANCE as: A contract by which one party (the insurer) undertakes to indemnify another party (the insured) against risk of loss, damage, or liability arising from the occurrence of some specified contingency, and to defend the insured or to pay for a defense regardless of whether…
Principles of Interpretation of Insurance Policies: 1) An insurance policy is a contract between the parties and is the law between the parties. 2) An insurance policy is construed using the general rules of interpretation of contracts set forth in the Civil Code. See La. C.C. art. 2045: Interpretation of…
In Louisiana, benefits under any personal insurance contract accruing upon the death, disablement, or injury of the individual insured are not payable to any beneficiary held by a final judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction to be criminally responsible for the death, disablement, or injury of the individual insured,…
The property insurer must prove by a clear preponderance of the evidence, either direct or circumstantial, that the loss was of incendiary origin, and that the insured was the person responsible for the fire.
Stacking of multiple UM (uninsured/underinsured motorist) liability policies is prohibited by the Anti-Stacking provision contained in La.R.S. 22:1295(1)(c), unless the injured party is occupying an automobile not owned by him/her, a resident spouse, or a resident relative. In that instance, the UM coverage on the automobile in which the injured…
In the absence of physical contact, the insured can prove “by an independent and disinterested witness, that the injury was the result of the actions of the driver of another vehicle whose identify is unknown.” La. R.S. 22:1295(1)(f). This is “justifiable because miss and run is too fraud-fraught: every driver…
Is it reasonably forseeable that the first permittee might allow others to operate the automobile? Implied permission by the named insured can be found even in the face of a specific prohibition against allowing others to operate the automobile if there is evidence that the named insured was aware of…