When Bodily Injury Limits are Stacked Jurisprudential Consistency Topples 36 Southern Illinois University Law Journal 2011-2012

36 S. Ill. U. L.J. 89 (2011-2012)
When Bodily Injury Limits are Stacked Jurisprudential Consistency Topples

handle is hein.journals/siulj36 and id is 93 raw text is: WHEN BODILY INJURY LIMITS ARE STACKED,
JURISPRUDENTIAL CONSISTENCY TOPPLES
Kevin P. Clark' and Chris Vanderbeek
I. INTRODUCTION
Imagine the following scenario: Your client is the only person injured
in a two-vehicle automobile accident. The other driver is at fault. His
vehicle is insured by a policy that covers a total of three vehicles. The limit
of liability on the policy is $50,000 per person and $100,000 per accident.
Your client undergoes several surgeries, incurring medical bills surpassing
$200,000. Because the other driver was at fault, his policy covers at least a
portion of those damages. Should your client be entitled to collect
$150,000 - the product of the policy limits and the number of insured
vehicles - from the tortfeasor's insurer, or should liability be limited to the
stated $50,000 policy limits, in spite of the existence of three vehicles on
the policy?
The answer depends on whether you can file your lawsuit in a
jurisdiction that permits stacking of bodily injury liability (BI) coverage. In
an automobile insurance context, stacking refers to the aggregation of
coverages provided separately to multiple insured vehicles.2 In some cases,
the vehicles are all insured under the same policy.3 In other cases, they are
* Kevin P. Clark is a member of the law firm of Boggs, Avellino, Lach & Boggs, LLC, which has
offices in Belleville, Illinois; Carbondale, Illinois; Glen Carbon, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri; and
Kansas City, Missouri. He is a member of the Illinois and Missouri Bars, the American Bar
Association, the Missouri Organization of Defense Lawyers and the National Society of
Professional Insurance Investigators. Mr. Clark is a Charter Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of
America.
** Christopher D. Vanderbeek is an associate attorney with the St. Louis, Missouri, law firm of
Danna McKitrick, P.C. He is a member of the firm's litigation department, focusing his practice
on defense of insurance claims. Prior to joining Danna McKitrick, Mr. Vanderbeek worked as an
associate attorney at Boggs, Avellino, Lach & Boggs, LLC, where his practice focused primarily
on defense of auto accident claims. Mr. Vanderbeek is a member of the Missouri and Illinois
Bars, the Eastern and Western Districts of Missouri, the American Bar Association, and the Bar
Association of Metropolitan St. Louis. He graduated from the University of Missouri School of
Law in May 2009.
1. The per-accident limit applies only if more than one accident victim has injuries sufficient to
command the $50,000 individual limit. Hereinafter, limits of liability per person and per accident,
respectively, will appear as $XX,XXX/$XX,XXX.
2. See, e.g., Hobbs v. Hartford Ins. Co. of the Midwest, 823 N.E.2d 561, 561 (111. App. Ct. 2005).
3. See id.

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