Koikos v. Travelers Insurance Co

In Koikos v. Travelers Insurance Co., 849 So. 2d 263 (Fla. 2003), two individuals were shot in a restaurant. The victims sued the owner for negligence. The policy covered "bodily injury or property damage arising out of any one occurrence." Id. at 266. The policy defined "occurrence" as "an accident, including continuous or repeated exposure to substantially the same general harmful conditions." It did not define "accident." Id. The Eleventh Circuit certified a question, which we rephrased as follows: When the insured is sued based on negligent failure to provide adequate security arising from separate shootings of multiple victims, are there multiple occurrences under the terms of an insurance policy that defines occurrence as "an accident, including continuous or repeated exposure to substantially the same general harmful conditions"? Id. at 264. The Court answered the question in the affirmative, holding that the "policy's definition of occurrence as applied to the facts of this case is susceptible to more than one reasonable interpretation." Id. at 273. Because the term "occurrence" was ambiguous, we construed it in the insured's favor. Id. The Court held that the injuries arose from the shooting and not from the insured's negligence.