Pacific Employers Ins Co v. Michigan Mut Ins Co

In Pacific Employers Ins Co v. Michigan Mut Ins Co, 452 Mich 218; 549 NW2d 872 (1996), the plaintiff general liability insurer of a school district sued, seeking a declaratory judgment that the defendant auto insurer of the school district was liable for injuries suffered by a kindergarten-age child who was struck by a car after being dropped off at the wrong stop by a school district bus. Id. at 220. The plaintiff's general liability policy and the defendant's auto policy contained language essentially identical to the policy language at issue in the present case regarding auto-related injuries. Id. at 221-222. There was no question in Pacific that the bus was "used" to transport the child shortly before the accident; however, whether that use caused the child's injuries was not as clear. In analyzing the issue of causation, the Court stated: The tort standard of causation is not determinative of causation in an insurance case. The insured must show more than the minimal "but for" causation. See Thornton v. Allstate Ins Co, 425 Mich 643, 650, 391 NW2d 320 (1986), in which this Court adopted a causation standard set forth in Kangas v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co, 64 Mich App 1, 17, 235 NW2d 42 (1975), that stated: "While the automobile need not be the proximate cause of the injury, there still must be a causal connection between the injury sustained and the ownership, maintenance or use of the automobile and which causal connection is more than incidental, fortuitous or but for. The injury must be foreseeably identifiable with the normal use, maintenance and ownership of the vehicle." Pacific, supra at 224-225. The Court concluded that the child's injury was sufficiently related to the use of the bus and held that the defendant auto insurer was solely responsible for providing coverage to the school district for the injury that arose out of the use of the covered motor vehicle. Id. at 228.