Joe Postel Secures Favorable Decision for Insurer Client in Declaratory Judgment Action

This week, Joe Postel secured a highly favorable decision for our insurer client. This order came in a Coles County lawsuit where the plaintiff alleges significant bodily injury after the car in which he was riding as a passenger struck a tractor-trailer parked on the side of the road, but the rear of the trailer was still in the road. Both the tractor and the trailer were covered under our insurer client’s policy. The plaintiff sought a declaratory judgment, claiming that since both the tractor and the trailer are separately listed with $1,000,000 liability limits, the total available coverage should be $2,000,000. His argument was based on an alleged ambiguity in the policy language.

We responded by emphasizing that the policy is clear and unambiguous — it expressly states that the most it will pay for damages resulting from any one accident is $1,000,000, regardless of the number of covered vehicles involved.  We relied principally on the Illinois Supreme Court’s decision in Kuhn v. Owners Ins. Co., 2024 IL 129895, in which the Court held that listing separate vehicles in Part Three of the Declarations, each with its own limit and premium, was merely a breakdown of the total limits and premiums shown in Part Two, which unambiguously limited the coverage to $1,000,000 per accident.

The plaintiff argued that Kuhn was distinguishable because it involved “true stacking,” i.e., stacking limits for an accident vehicle and non-accident vehicles, whereas in this case the plaintiff sought to stack the limits for two accident vehicles.  We argued that the distinction was immaterial.

Based on the plain language of the policy, the Court found that there is no ambiguity, and the $1,000,000 per accident limit applies.  This decision is a strong affirmation of the policy language as written and supports the position we’ve consistently maintained for our insurer client throughout this case.