Northville Township v Northville Public Schools, 469 Mich 285 (2003)
N/A
OUTCOME: Prevailed in Michigan Supreme Court
Under the Revised School Code, the board of a school district may not design or build a school building to be used for instructional or noninstructional school purposes or design and implement the desi...gn for a school site unless the design or construction complies with the construction of school buildings act. The Superintendent of Public Instruction has exclusive jurisdiction over the review and approval of plans and specifications for the construction, reconstruction, or remodeling of school buildings used for instructional and noninstructional school purposes and of site plans for those school buildings. Thus, under the RSC, the construction of school buildings is subject only to the standards of the construction of school buildings act and the approval of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, and such construction is not subject to local zoning requirements. In this case, the defendant school district planned the construction of a school building within the plaintiff township's boundaries. The township requested certain changes in the plan, but the defendants refused to adopt all the suggested changes on the basis that the school building was exempt from local zoning regulations. The township filed suit, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief, and the intervening plaintiffs, adjoining property owners, joined the suit and moved for summary disposition. However, under the grant of exclusive jurisdiction over construction matters to the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the construction of a school building is exempt from local zoning regulations, and thus the trial court properly denied summary disposition for the plaintiffs
Appeals
Valcaniant v Detroit Edison Co, 470 Mich 82 (2004)
N/A
OUTCOME: Prevailed in Michigan Supreme Court
In determining whether a legal duty exists, a court examines various factors, including the foreseeability of the harm, the degree of certainty of injury, the closeness of the connection between the co...nduct and the injury, the moral blame attached to the conduct, the prevention of future harm, and the burdens and consequences of imposing a duty and the resulting liability for breach. In this case, a dump truck, being directed by one of the plaintiffs, severed an overhead power line of the defendant utility which crossed the plaintiff's property, and electricity from the line traversed the wet ground to where the plaintiff was standing and rendered the plaintiff unconscious. The defendant utility's fault sensor system detected the fault caused by the severed line and stopped the current flow, but pursuant to its design the system restarted the flow three times within six seconds while rechecking whether the fault had cleared. As a result of the fault check cycle, the plaintiff received burns on his back and arm. The plaintiffs brought suit against the defendant utility, asserting negligence in the failure of its system to stop current flow immediately upon the detection of the fault. The defendant moved for summary disposition, asserting that it had no duty to the injured plaintiff. The plaintiffs argued that the defendant utility should have foreseen that its system would cause injury. However, the defendant had no obligation to anticipate that a dump truck operated under the plaintiff's direction would sever an overhead power line which was suspended more than twenty-five feet above ground, nor that the plaintiff would be standing on wet ground nearby. Under the circumstances, the defendant utility had no duty to anticipate that the plaintiff would be injured by the fault check system, and thus had no duty upon which the plaintiffs could assert a claim in negligence. The trial court improperly denied summary disposition for the defendant utility.
Appeals
Hill v L F Transportation, 277 Mich App 500 (2008)
N/A
OUTCOME: Prevailed at Michigan Court of Appeals
A person may intervene by right when the applicant claims an interest relating to the property or transaction which is the subject of the action and is so situated that the disposition of the action ma...y as a practical matter impair or impede the applicant’s ability to protect that interest, unless the applicant’s interest is adequately represented by existing parties. The likelihood that the person seeking to intervene would prevail on his claim is not a consideration in determining whether he has a right to intervene. In this case, the plaintiff's decedent was killed in a vehicle collision in 1994. The insurer of the vehicle driven by the other person involved in the collision refused to acknowledge coverage, even following an appellate court decision declaring its liability for coverage. The plaintiff then sought uninsured motorists benefits from the appellant insurer, which had been the insurer of the decedent's vehicle. The plaintiff's claim for uninsured motorist benefits was contested by the appellant insurer, and arbitration was ordered by the trial court. On appeal from an arbitration award to the plaintiff, the award was reversed, including an award of sanctions, because uninsured motorist coverage could not apply to a collision involving another insured vehicle, despite the other insurer's refusal to acknowledge its liability. The appellate court ordered summary disposition for the appellant insurer, and the appellant then obtained an award of costs and a judgment against the decedent's estate for $85,885.11, plus interest, payable from any available property of the estate. The plaintiff then commenced a wrongful death action against the persons involved in the collision, and the appellant insurer moved to intervene, seeking to recover the taxed costs. The trial court permitted the addition of the appellant as an interested party but refused to permit intervention, and following an award on the wrongful death claim to the plaintiff for $465,000, the appellant again sought to intervene but the court concluded that the wrongful death award was not an award to the estate and, because the recovery of costs was against the decedent's estate, thus that the appellant's claim was not meritorious and precluded intervention. However, the court's assessment of the validity of the claim should not have controlled the appellant's right to intervene. The controversy involved an interest in property to which the appellant had a claim, and therefore the appellant should have been permitted to intervene.
If a plaintiff who has once dismissed an action in any court commences an action based on or including the same claim against the same defendant, the court may order the payment of such costs of the action previously dismissed as it deems proper and may stay proceedings until the plaintiff has complied with the order. Thus, a plaintiff may not avoid the payment of costs merely by dismissing an action and commencing a new action. In this case, the issue of the appellant's liability, being based on the underlying wrongful death, was the same essential claim in both the prior action and the current action, and the plaintiff could not avoid liability for the costs awarded in the prior action by commencing a new action. The awarded costs were required to be deducted from the plaintiff's recovery before distribution of the remaining proceeds. The trial court improperly refused to permit the appellant to intervene and recover its award of costs.
Appeals
Angott v Chubb Group of Insurance Companies, 270 Mich App 465 (2006)
N/A
OUTCOME: Prevailed at Court of Appeals
To waive its rights against an insured, an insurer must have intentionally and knowingly relinquished those rights. Conduct which does not express any intent to relinquish a known right is not a waiver..., and a waiver cannot be inferred by mere silence. Waiver may be shown by proof of express language of agreement or inferably established by a declaration, an act, and conduct of the party against whom it is claimed. In this case, the plaintiff obtained insurance coverage, including extended replacement cost, for a residence from one defendant insurer. In December 2000, water pipes in the home burst and caused damage to the lower level of the house. The plaintiff submitted a proof of loss to the defendant, but the defendant disputed coverage. In December 2001, the plaintiff brought suit, and the defendant answered the complaint and demanded that the controversy be submitted to an appraisal panel as provided in the contract and in statute. In its answer, the defendant maintained that coverage was not disputed but that only the damages were in controversy. The matter was submitted to appraisal, and the panel issued an award for $1,058,750. The defendant tendered $242,795, and moved to modify the award on the basis that the award included damages not included within the insurance coverage. The trial court granted the modification and entered judgment for the plaintiff consistent with the modification. The plaintiff appealed, arguing that the defendant should have been precluded from contesting the coverage. The defendant had conceded coverage in its pleadings, and had sought submission to an appraisal panel on the basis that only the amount of damages was in dispute, and thus the defendant had waived the issue of coverage. The trial court improperly modified the appraisal award, and the plaintiff was entitled to judgment on the award
