Questions arise when an insurer is faced with multiple claimants and insufficient policy limits to settle all claims. Join partners Colleen E. Hayes and Thomas M. Wester for a discussion of the approaches various...more
Ohio- Substantially compliant acknowledgment clause WWSD, LLC v. Woods, 10th Dist. Franklin No. 20AP-403, 2022-Ohio-952- In this appeal, the Tenth Appellate District affirmed the trial court’s decision, agreeing that...more
Bass, Berry & Sims attorney Chris Lazarini analyzed a case in which two defendants – a former employee and a company that assisted in the sale of the business – both claimed entitlement to funds held by an attorney in trust...more
Recent decisions provide worthwhile guidance for insurers handling slayer claims. According to traditional inheritance law, a “slayer” is one who intentionally kills, or conspires to kill, feloniously or unjustifiably,...more
Based upon a somewhat cryptic set of facts, the United States District Court recently looked at two issues regularly employed or encountered by practitioners: interpleader actions and motions for more definite statement....more
In Jackson National Life Insurance Co. v. Dobbins, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment for an insurer in an interpleader action, which resolved, among other things,...more
Bass, Berry & Sims attorney Chris Lazarini discussed a case in which a brokerage firm filed a complaint for interpleader seeking judicial resolution of a challenge to a deceased client’s assets. Upon the client’s death, the...more
Bass, Berry & Sims attorney Chris Lazarini discussed a case centered around three IRA accounts and the duty that UBS had to the beneficiary following the death of the client/IRA account holder. Prior to the client’s death,...more
In 1997, League City, Texas, created the League City Public Improvement District to fund improvements for the proposed master planned community of Magnolia Creek. Planned improvements included street lights, drainage...more
• In Laborers' Pension Fund v. Miscevic, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that the Illinois slayer statute is one state statute that is not pre-empted by ERISA. A slayer statute is a law that prevents an...more
On March 13, 2018, the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals held that an insurance company can pay the proceeds of a life insurance policy into the court when there is a dispute as to who is the rightful beneficiary. At...more
We turn once again to the sad and difficult task that plan administrators face when distributing the benefits of a participant who has been murdered by his or her designated beneficiary. Sad for obvious reasons. Difficult...more
So, what is LIBOR? LIBOR—the London Interbank Offered Rate—is one of the most ubiquitous benchmarks for determining short-term interest rates in bank (and other) lending. LIBOR rates are short-term fixed rates quoted for...more
Vessels cannot sail without fuel. This industry truth is recognized in contracts and under U.S. maritime law. In fact, enabling ship operators to efficiently obtain fuel is so important that U.S. maritime law purports to...more
Retirement plans are complicated creatures to administer so it perhaps is not surprising that the process of determining the beneficiary of a deceased participant can present its own set of challenges and, if things go awry,...more
Judge Easterbrook and his colleagues on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit aren’t about to exercise jurisdiction over a civil action of interpleader merely on credit or promises to pay. The plaintiff has to...more
Your insured is sued, along with several other additional or named insureds. You receive a policy limits demand that is reasonable, but the limit is insufficient to settle all claims against all of the defendants. What do you...more
The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York denied a reinsurer’s motion to intervene in an interpleader action in which Battenkill Insurance Company argued it had an 85% interest in the funds at...more
In my last blog post on interpleader actions, we explored the benefits a financial services firm can obtain from filing an interpleader action. An interpleader action protects the holder of assets (such as a bank account,...more