The Fifth District Appellate Court affirmed Madison County Associate Judge Ronald Foster’s order granting a stay against Progressive Insurance's lawsuit seeking declaratory relief while the underlying crash suit is pending.
Justice Barry Vaughan delivered the Rule 23 decision on April 2 with Justices Thomas Welch and Judy Cates concurring. The appellate court concluded that Foster’s order granting defendant Pamela Green’s motion to stay “must be affirmed.”
“Accordingly, we cannot find that the trial court’s order reveals that it ‘acted arbitrarily without the employment of conscientious judgment or, in view of all the circumstances, exceeded the bounds of reason and ignored recognized principles of law so that substantial prejudice resulted,’" Vaughan wrote.
Plaintiff Progressive Universal Insurance Co. filed its complaint on June 16, 2023, in the Madison County Circuit Court, seeking declaratory judgment against defendants Tori Lonsdale, Cara Lonsdale, Pamela Green and Chemical Concepts Inc.
According to its complaint, Tori Lonsdale was driving a 2015 Chevrolet Cruze in Alton on Oct. 12, 2022, when she was involved in a collision with Green’s vehicle. Green then filed a lawsuit against Lonsdale and Chemical Concepts on Jan. 26, 2023, alleging Chemical Concepts was Lonsdale's employer at the time of the crash.
Green's lawsuit alleged Lonsdale failed to stop at a posted traffic control device and collided with her vehicle.
Progressive filed its complaint requesting the court to find that the vehicle driven by Lonsdale at the time of the collision was not a covered vehicle under the Lonsdale family insurance policy.
Progressive argued that the policy only covered three vehicles with Cara Lonsdale as the policy owner. It adds that Cara Lonsdale did not notify the insurer of the Cruze within 30 days of its purchase, did not ask Progressive to provide coverage on the vehicle, and did not pay a premium on that vehicle.
The insurer sought an order from the court declaring that it did not owe a duty to defend the Lonsdales or Chemical Concepts in relation to Green’s litigation, did not owe a duty to indemnify the defendants and was not responsible to pay any sums awarded to Green in relation to the litigation at issue.
On Aug. 1, 2023, Green filed a motion to stay the proceedings until the litigation in her underlying lawsuit against Tori Lonsdale and Chemical Concepts was "fully and completely resolved." She argued that Progressive was already paying a law firm to defend Lonsdale in Green's lawsuit. She added that there is a difference between a duty to indemnify and a duty to defend, claiming that "permitting Progressive to withdraw its defense in the middle of the litigation would be greatly prejudicial to Tori and Chemical Concepts since her defense had 'been to date exclusively controlled by counsel selected by Progressive.'"
Progressive opposed the motion, arguing that no material fact in Green's lawsuit was at issue and the claims of conflict or reservation of rights were inapplicable.
Foster granted the motion to stay on Nov. 3, and Progressive appealed.
On appeal, Progressive argues that the trial court's order granting the stay was an abuse of discretion.
“It argues that the trial court ignored recognized principles of law in granting the motion because it was an abuse of discretion for a trial court to grant a stay when the declaratory judgment proceeding did not involve a determination of ultimate facts in the underlying case,” Vaughan wrote.
Green responded that no abuse of discretion can be shown because Progressive failed to provide a full record, among other arguments.
Progressive replied that the record on appeal was sufficiently complete.
“It argues that all of the pleadings at issue, as well as the trial court’s judgment, were provided to this court and that is all that is necessary to determine that the trial court’s order was an abuse of discretion,” Vaughan wrote.
However, the appellate court disagreed. It concluded that the record tendered for review “is insufficient to determine why the court ruled as it did. In such situations, we must presume the court’s action ‘was in conformity with the law and was properly supported by the evidence.’”
“This alone would require this court to affirm the trial court’s order,” Vaughan wrote.
The appellate court also noted that while Progressive argues that it was simply asking the court to determine whether the vehicle at issue was insured under the policy, its prayer for relief seeks more.
“While Progressive claimed the “Chemical Concepts issue” addressed during oral argument was a red herring, we disagree. Progressive’s declaratory judgment petition specifically requested a finding of no coverage for Chemical Concepts,” Vaughan wrote. “Without evidence regarding the policy at issue for Chemical Concepts, a declaratory judgment in favor of Progressive would be erroneous as a matter of law, without even considering Tori’s relationship, if any, with that company.”
Madison County Circuit Court case number 23-MR-167