Who Needs the Owner's Manual? Virginia Supreme Court Explains Purpose of Car Doors

Betty Sleigh is a parking enforcement officer for the City of Alexandria. Crystal Gibson is a parking scofflaw. Inevitably, on May 10, 1999, these two encountered each other when Ms. Gibson illegally parked her car on the street during street cleaning hours. Fireman's Fund Insurance Co. v. Sleigh, 267 Va. 768, 594 S.E.2d 604 (2004).

Ms. Sleigh alighted from her trusty police vehicle, a Cushman cart, no doubt, and was prepared to issue a citation to Ms. Gibson's offending auto, when M s. Gibson ran out of a nearby building and opened the driver's door into Ms. Sleigh's arm. Realizing she had forgotten her keys, Ms. Gibson yelled for a friend to toss her the keys and reopened the door into the officer. After retrieving the keys, Ms. Gibson then opened the door into Ms. Sleigh a third time, causing Ms. Sleigh to fall into her police vehicle and injure her back.

Ms. Sleigh filed a motion for judgment against Ms. Gibson, but Ms. Gibson, in addition to feeling that she could park wherever she wished, also apparently believed that auto insurance is for suckers. So, M s. Sleigh sued her insurer for uninsured motorist coverage.

The insurer claimed that Ms. Gibson was not “using” her car as a vehicle when she struck Ms. Sleigh with the car door. The UIM clause stated that the insurer shall pay the insured for bodily injury sustained in an accident “arising out of the ownership, maintenance, or use” of an uninsured automobile. Va. Code Ann. § 38.2-2206 requires all auto insurance policies to include coverage for damages recoverable from “the owner or operator of an uninsured motor vehicle.”

The insurer contended that Virginia case law requires the “use of a vehicle as a vehicle” for UIM coverage to accrue. See Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. v. Smelser, 264 Va. 109, 563 S.E.2d 760 (2002). The insurer argued that Ms. Gibson was not using her car as a vehicle but was using the car door to inflict injury.

Ms. Sleigh, and the trial court, believed that the issue is not the tortfeasor's intent but whether the vehicle was being employed in the ordinary manner for which it was designed and constructed and whether there was a causal connection between the use and the injury.

The Virginia Supreme Court, in a groundbreaking ruling, stated “[c]ar doors are designed and manufactured to be opened and closed.” 267 Va. at 772, 594 S.E.2d at 606. Accordingly, the court held that Ms. Gibson's opening of the door into Ms. Sleigh was within the contemplation of the parties to the insurance contract, and Ms. Sleigh was entitled to UIM coverage. Ms. Gibson, presumably, was entitled to UIJ (U in Jail) coverage.

“This Looks Like a Good Spot… Aiieeeeee!”

In Schlimmer v. Poverty Hunt Club, 268 Va. 74, 597 S.W.2d 43 (2004), Herman Schlimmer took his 14-yearold son Karl to a hunt club during deer season in 1996. Nolen Cofield was one of the other hunters. The hunt club assigned hunting stands to the different groups of hunters. The Schlimmers were assigned to “Fletcher's Old Stand.” A hunt club official was supposed to meet them at the “loading dock” to take them to the stand, but this official did not arrive at the appointed time. After waiting 10-15 minutes, the elder Schlimmer got impatient and led his son into the brush to find the stand.

Soon thereafter, the father decided they would stay at another stand he had used before. The Schlimmers sat for a moment, and they saw Mr. Cofield walking nearby, but they said nothing. The younger Schlimmer asked his father if they were in “a good place?” They decided to move to another spot. The younger Schlimmer, who was wearing an orange hat and camouflage jacket, had not moved, but Cofield shot him from 67 yards away.

Cofield gave conflicting versions of the events to the game warden and at trial, but the game warden charged him with recklessly discharging a firearm in violation of Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-56.1(A). Cofield pleaded guilty to the criminal charge.

At the trial in the civil suit, the Schlimmers asked the trial judge to instruct the jury that Mr. Cofield's violation of § 18.2-56 .1(A) constituted negligence per se. The trial judge refused on the grounds that M r. Cofield could have recklessly discharged a weapon and still not have hit young Schlimmer.

After the jury returned a verdict for the defense, the Schlimmers appealed. The supreme court noted that there are three elements to negligence per se: (1) the statute was enacted for public safety, (2) the injured person belongs to the class of persons the statute is intended to protect, and (3) the harm was of the type to be prevented, and the statutory infraction was a proximate cause of the harm. The first two are questions of law for the court, but the last is an issue of fact for the jury.

The court held that Cofield had violated a statute designed for public safety and that Master Schlimmer was a member of the protected class. As to the third, the court said that proximate cause was a question for the jury and that the Schlimmers were entitled to the negligence per se instruction to let the jury decide the matter. Accordingly, the court held that the trial court had erred in refusing the instruction and remanded the case for a new trial. For his part, young Schlimmer might now be a member of PETA.