{
  "id": 1902406,
  "name": "Troy Allen GULLETT v. Cecily BROWN and Gallagher-Bassett Services, Inc. as Administrator of Self-insurance Plan of Uninsured Motorists for Pulaski County, Arkansas",
  "name_abbreviation": "Gullett v. Brown",
  "decision_date": "1991-12-16",
  "docket_number": "90-320",
  "first_page": "385",
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      "cite": "820 S.W.2d 457"
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      "cite": "Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 23-89-403",
      "category": "laws:leg_statute",
      "reporter": "Ark. Code Ann.",
      "year": 1987,
      "opinion_index": 0
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    {
      "cite": "422 A.2d 556",
      "category": "reporters:state_regional",
      "reporter": "A.2d",
      "case_ids": [
        152714
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      "year": 1980,
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        "/pa-super/281/0452-01"
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    {
      "cite": "Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 1",
      "category": "laws:leg_statute",
      "reporter": "Ark. Code Ann.",
      "opinion_index": 0
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    {
      "cite": "252 Ark. 624",
      "category": "reporters:state",
      "reporter": "Ark.",
      "case_ids": [
        1630033
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      "weight": 3,
      "year": 1972,
      "opinion_index": 0,
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T22:45:32.876763+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
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  "casebody": {
    "judges": [],
    "parties": [
      "Troy Allen GULLETT v. Cecily BROWN and Gallagher-Bassett Services, Inc. as Administrator of Self-insurance Plan of Uninsured Motorists for Pulaski County, Arkansas"
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "Steele Hays, Justice.\nBy this appeal we are asked to hold that workers\u2019 compensation benefits are not the exclusive remedy of an employee injured in the course of his employment by an uninsured motorist where those benefits are provided by the employer\u2019s self-insurance. We decline that request and affirm the trial court.\nIn September, 1987 Troy Allen Gullett was injured in a motor vehicle collision. Gullett was a passenger in a vehicle belonging to his employer, Pulaski County, and being driven by another county employee. The other vehicle was driven by Cecily Brown. Gullett brought this action at law against Cecily Brown, Gallagher-Bassett Services, Inc., as administrator of a self-insurance plan of Pulaski County, and Jason Ruby and others as director and representatives of Metroplan Risk Management Association. The complaint alleges that Brown\u2019s negligence was the proximate cause of the accident, that Brown was uninsured and that at the time of the occurrence Pulaski County had in effect an agreement to provide uninsured motorist coverage on its vehicles through a self-insurance agreement administered by Gallagher-Bassett which coverage inured to Gullett\u2019s benefit. Gullett sought damages against the defendants in the sum of $100,000, costs and attorneys fees.\nCecily Brown generally denied the allegations of the complaint and the remaining defendants filed a motion to dismiss the complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and for failure to state facts upon which relief could be granted. Ark. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6). The motion alleged that Pulaski County was self-insured for workers\u2019 compensation, that Gullett\u2019s injuries were incurred in the course of his employment, that Gullett had filed for and was receiving workers\u2019 compensation benefits and such benefits constitute an exclusive remedy under the Arkansas Workers\u2019 Compensation Act. The motion further alleged that Pulaski County is a self-insured for uninsured motorists.\nIn response, Gullett alleged that Pulaski County had purchased a plan of insurance through the Metroplan Risk Management Association and said uninsured motorist was reinsured through an insurance carrier and administered by GallagherBassett. Gullett admitted his injuries arose from the scope of his employment but denied that workers\u2019 compensation was an exclusive remedy where the injured employee is a beneficiary of a policy of uninsured motorist coverage, citing The Travelers Insurance Co. v. National Farmers Union Property and Casualty Co., et al., 252 Ark. 624, 480 S.W.2d 585 (1972).\nThe circuit court entered an order finding that Cecily Brown was an uninsured motorist at the time of the accident, that Gullett had collected workers\u2019 compensation benefits under coverage maintained by Pulaski County through Metroplan Risk Management Association, that Pulaski County had in effect an agreement through the association \u201cto provide uninsured motorists coverage for vehicles owned by Pulaski County and that said self-insurance was administered by Gallagher-Bassett Services, Inc.\u201d Upon those findings the complaint was dismissed as to all defendants but Cecily Brown. Subsequently, Gullett took a non-suit as to Cecily Brown and appealed from the order of dismissal.\nAppellant relies entirely on the case of Travelers Insurance Co. v. National Farmers Union Property and Casualty Co., et al., supra. In Travelers, the employee, Calvin McCord, was killed when he was struck by an uninsured motorist. Travelers paid workers\u2019 compensation to McCord\u2019s dependents and sought subrogation against the proceeds recovered by McCord\u2019s estate under McCord\u2019s uninsured motorists coverage through National Farmers Union Property and Casualty, a policy bought and paid for by McCord. We affirmed the trial court\u2019s denial of subrogation by Travelers against uninsured motorist benefits payable to Calvin McCord\u2019s administratrix. Travelers relied primarily on Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 1 l-9-410(a)(l) (1987), providing that the making of a claim for workers\u2019 compensation \u201cshall not affect the right of the employee, or his dependents, to make claim or maintain an action in court against any third party for such injury\u201d and awarding the compensation carrier two-thirds of the net proceeds. Noting that uninsured motorist coverage is a form of accident or indemnity insurance, we said that if Travelers could subrogate as to McCord\u2019s own uninsured motorist recovery, there would be no reason why McCord\u2019s health, accident and hospital insurance benefits would not also be subject to subrogation by a workers\u2019 compensation carrier:\nA workmen\u2019s compensation carrier has no more right under the subrogation statute to benefit from this type of insurance which a covered employee elects to take at his own expense than it would from the proceeds of health, accident, or hospital insurance. [Our emphasis.]\nWe regard it as a significant distinction that in Travelers the uninsured motorist coverage was provided under the employee\u2019s own policy, acquired by the employee and to which Travelers had no claim whatever. There are frequent references throughout that opinion to the fact that it was McCord who bought and paid for the policy under which the benefits were provided and it is clear this court placed considerable emphasis on that circumstance, which, as we have seen, is wholly absent in the case before us. We also note that in Travelers the court never reached the exclusivity rule, an additional indication of the dissimilarity between the two cases.\nTurning elsewhere for guidance, we believe the case of Mitchell v. Philadelphia Electric Company, 422 A.2d 556 (1980), is instructive. Mitchell was injured while a passenger in a truck owned by his employer, Philadelphia Electric Company. The injuries were caused by an uninsured motorist. The electric company was self-insured. Mitchell brought this action against his self-insured employer to recover the equivalent of uninsured motorists benefits.\nThe electric company defended on the theory that Pennsylvania\u2019s uninsured motorists statute, like our own, [Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 23-89-403 (1987)] was not obligatory and that workers\u2019 compensation benefits were an exclusive remedy as to any cause of action by an employee against an employer. Conceding that a claim for uninsured motorist benefits sounded more in contract than in tort, the court held nevertheless that the language of Pennsylvania workers\u2019 compensation act does not except contract actions from the exclusivity rule and sustained the trial court\u2019s dismissal of Mitchell\u2019s asserted action at law. That holding was reaffirmed in Lewis v. School District of Philadelphia, 538 A.2d 862 (1988).\nOur own statute, Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 11-9-105 (1987), like Pennsylvania\u2019s, makes no exception for contract actions and in numerous decisions we have interpreted the act as exclusive of all other rights and remedies. See, e.g., Seawright v. U.S.F.&G. Co., 275 Ark. 96, 627 S.W.2d 557 (1982):\nThe rights and remedies herein granted to an employee ... on account of injury or death, shall be exclusive of all other rights and remedies of such employee, his legal representative, dependents, or next of kin, or anyone otherwise entitled to recover damages from such employer. . . .\nFor the reasons stated the order is\nAffirmed.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "Steele Hays, Justice."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Hoofman & Bingham, P.A., by: John Biscoe Bingham, for appellant.",
      "The Walter Murray Law Firm, P.A., for appellees."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "Troy Allen GULLETT v. Cecily BROWN and Gallagher-Bassett Services, Inc. as Administrator of Self-insurance Plan of Uninsured Motorists for Pulaski County, Arkansas\n90-320\n820 S.W.2d 457\nSupreme Court of Arkansas\nOpinion delivered December 16, 1991\nHoofman & Bingham, P.A., by: John Biscoe Bingham, for appellant.\nThe Walter Murray Law Firm, P.A., for appellees."
  },
  "file_name": "0385-01",
  "first_page_order": 411,
  "last_page_order": 415
}