Monat v. State Farm Insurance

We granted leave to appeal in this case to examine the mutuality requirement of the doctrine of collateral estoppel. In this first-party, no-fault action, defendant seeks to invoke collateral estoppel to preclude plaintiff from relitigating an issue already decided in plaintiff’s third-party negligence action. Due only to a lack of mutuality, the Court of Appeals, in a split decision, affirmed the trial court’s denial of defendant’s motion for summary disposition. We hold that, where collateral estoppel is being asserted *681defensively against a party who has already had a full and fair…