Despite those assurances, the state court lawsuit alleged, Zach Trimbur continued his conduct. At some unspecified time “in the days before April 7, 2017,” he texted his classmate, Julia Morath:

That's ok with me, so go back to your hellhole of a home and sit in your room and let some more guys come and penetrate you as you desperately reach out for any attention you can grasp because you are afraid of everything and anything. No one cares about your health issues and how you are an anorexic, bulimic, receding hairline cunt who goes home and cuts herself every night to cope with the fact that guys will only ever do anything with you due to the fact that you are easy and that your own mother doesn't even love you. So then you have to go back to a hospital with all of your other freak show disabled people that don't know how to stick a piece of food in there [sic] mouths. You claim to cut people off but no one cares about you enough to give a shit. Also you should probably work better on covering up your scars located on EVERYWHERE on your fucking body because they make you look more repulsive than you already do. Best regards,

The state court lawsuit alleged that Julia Morath felt “distraught with severe mental and emotional pain and suffering.” She showed the text message to her parents, who then informed school administrators of the message on April 6, 2017. The high school suspended Zach Trimbur the same day, but he allegedly “continued to harass, bully, and/or cyberbully” Julia Morath after his suspension.

Julia Morath died by suicide on April 7, 2017.

The homeowners' insurance company for Zach Trimbur and his parents, State Farm Fire and Casualty Company, sought a declaratory judgment that it had no duty to provide a defense to Zach Trimbur.

State Farm contended that “[t]he alleged bodily injury sustained by Julia Morath did not arise from an 'occurrence'” – that is, an “accident” – triggering coverage under the policy, because Zach Trimbur's “harassment, bullying and cyber-bull[y]ing [was] inherently non-accidental in nature.”

Zach Trimbur countered that Pennsylvania law required that the court consider the foreseeability of the injury from his perspective, and that although he could not dispute sending the text message, Julia Morath's death by suicide constituted an extraordinary intervening event far beyond anything contemplated in the text message and unforeseeable as to him.

The parties moved for judgment in their favor.

The District Court's Decision

The district court granted Zach Trimbur's motion for judgment on the pleadings.

In its decision, the district court explained that the Moraths, in their individual capacities and as co-administrators of their daughter's estate, sued Zach Trimbur for negligence, as well as wrongful death, and survival. They alleged that Zach Trimbur's conduct was “unreasonable, negligent, grossly negligent, careless, and reckless and [he] intentionally breached his duty to exercise due care generally” and in various particular respects, including, among other thing, his “fail[ure] to use his cell phone in a reasonable manner” and acting “with a reckless disregard to Julia Morath's health and safety.”

The district court decided that State Farm had to defend Zach Trimbur because the negligence claim against him fell within the scope of the “occurrence” language in the State Farm insurance policy.

According to the district court, viewing the events from Zach Trimbur's perspective, it could “not conclusively find” that death by suicide was “foreseeable from his cyberbullying” because suicide constituted an independent intervening act “so extraordinary as not to have been reasonably foreseeable by the original tortfeasor.”

The district court concluded that, from Zach Trimbur's perspective, his classmate's death by suicide was “an accident,” and the Moraths' negligence claim fell within the scope of the State Farm policy.

The case is State Farm Fire and Casualty Co. v. Motta, No. 18-3956 (E.D. Pa. Dec. 11, 2018).