Significant Victory for Insurers by Pretzel & Stouffer Before Illinois Supreme Court

In a significant victory for the insurance industry, Pretzel & Stouffer attorneys, Robert Chemers and Jonathan Federman, prevailed today for an insurer in the Supreme Court of Illinois. The court issued its opinion this morning reversing the trial court and the Illinois Appellate Court, Fifth District, and directing the trial court to enter judgment for the insurer that the bodily injury limits on its policy insuring four vehicles do not stack but that the exposure of the carrier is limited to $100,000 per person and $300,000 per accident which was previously paid as that was the undisputed amount of coverage.

In this case, the 19 year old insured allegedly crossed the center line and hit head on a car driven by a grandfather with his twin six year old granddaughters. The insured died, as did the grandfather and one of his granddaughters. The other child survived but claimed significant injury.

The Trial court stacked the limits four times to $400,000 per person and $1.2M for the accident to account for each vehicle insured under the policy. The Appellate Court modified to stack twice. The Supreme Court held there was no ambiguity and that the policy did not stack.