30 Fla. L. Weekly S172d
SANDRA MALU, Petitioner, v. SECURITY NATIONAL INSURANCE COMPANY, Respondent. Supreme Court of Florida. Case No. SC03-1327. LAZARO PADILLA, et al., Petitioners, v. LIBERTY MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY, et al., Respondents. Case No. SC03-1432. March 17, 2005. Two Cases Consolidated: SC03-1327 – Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal – Certified Direct Conflict of Decisions. Fourth District – Case No. 4D02-391 (Broward County). Counsel: Carlos Lidsky of Lidsky, Vaccaro and Montes, Hialeah, Diane H. Tutt and Sharon C. Degnan of Diane H. Tutt, P.A., Plantation, for Petitioner. Beth T. Vogelsang of Barranco, Kircher, and Vogelsang, P.A., Miami, for Respondent. SC03-1432 – Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal – Certified Direct Conflict of Decisions. Third District – Case Nos. 3D01-1187 and 3D01-2526 (Dade County). Counsel: Carlos Lidsky of Lidsky, Vaccaro and Montes, Hialeah, Diane H. Tutt and Sharon C. Degnan of Diane H. Tutt, P.A., Plantation, for Petitioner. Nina K. Brown, Mark S. Shapiro and Jennifer Cohen Glasser of Akerman Senterfitt, Miami, on behalf of Liberty Mutual Insurance Company; and Doreen E. Lasch of Conroy, Simberg, Ganon, Krevens and Abel, P.A., on behalf of Urban Insurance Company of Pennsylvania, for Respondents.CORRECTED OPINION[Original Opinion at 30 Fla. L. Weekly S145a]
Editor’s note. At 30 Fla. L. Weekly S146, right-hand column, third full paragraph, the second sentence is corrected by substituting “were” for “was.” The corrected sentence reads as follows. “In response to the complaints, both Liberty Mutual and Urban filed extensive motions to dismiss, arguing that the amounts they paid to their insureds in connection with transportation to obtain medical treatment were reasonable as a matter of law.”
Footnote 2 is revised to read as follows:
2In a separate proceeding, Padilla filed a request with the DOI for a declaratory statement on whether it had primary jurisdiction to determine rates of reimbursement for automobile mileage payable under PIP insurance policies. The DOI dismissed the request, and Padilla appealed to the First District Court of Appeal. The First District affirmed the dismissal, holding that administrative agencies should not issue declaratory statements that could interfere with pending judicial proceedings. The First District further held that the DOI did not have statutory authority to set mileage reimbursement rates. Padilla v. Liberty Mutual Ins. Co., 832 So. 2d 916, 920 n.3 (Fla. 1st DCA 2002). In the present appeal, respondents do not assert the doctrine of primary jurisdiction as a basis for affirming the dismissal. Security National explicitly abandoned the claim, Liberty Mutual declared that primary jurisdiction is no longer an issue in this case, and Urban claimed that the question of jurisdiction over determining reasonable rates of reimbursement is a moot issue since the PIP statute does not provide for such benefit. We therefore decline to address it.
