No bad faith where there was a dispute as to whether the accident caused the injury
In Haltom v. Great Northwest Ins., the issue was whether Plaintiffs' knee injury arose out of the car accident she was in a few weeks before. When Haltom was checked out after the accident, she complained of many things, but not her knee. A few weeks later, while doing yoga, her knee began to hurt. She sought treatment and an MRI 4 months after the accident showed no tear. But a few months after that, she had a tear in her knee and got it fixed. She told the doctor her knee was hurt in the car accident. In the meantime, the other driver agreed to pay policy limits and Haltom asked Great Northwest for a subrogation waiver. Eventually, Great Northwest agreed to the waiver and paid her $10,000 in med pay. Later, it declined any payment under her underinsured motorist coverage, claiming that the knee problem was not related to the accident.
Summary judgment to the insurance company was affirmed. It was not unreasonable to question whether the knee was injured in the accident, especially since there was no evidence of injury to the knee after the accident in the emergency room, and the first MRI did not show any tear.
