Patent Infringement: Successful Litigation Stays the "Course"
In Johnson v. Lowe’s Home Centers LLC, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a district court order granting defendant Lowe’s motion to compel arbitration of plaintiff Maria Johnson’s individual claims brought under...more
Another Circuit Court Holds That the New York Convention Pre-empts State Laws Prohibiting Arbitration of Insurance Disputes - On August 12, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that Article II, Section...more
An insured filed suit in a Florida district court for breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty in connection with the defendant-carriers’ handling of claims made under the insured’s disability insurance policies....more
Plaintiffs filed a putative class action against Norwegian Cruise Lines claiming that Norwegian failed to disclose profits it earned when the plaintiffs elected to purchase travel insurance during the cruise booking process....more
Lamorak Insurance Co. issued excess policies to Olin Corp. and also reinsured those policies with the defendants, Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s, London. After Lamorak and Olin settled a declaratory judgment action...more
The Southern District of New York found that New York Insurance Law section 1213(c)(1), requiring that foreign insurers post sufficient security, applied to the defendant, a foreign reinsurer in liquidation, in order for the...more
A Pennsylvania federal district court granted a motion to compel arbitration pursuant to 9 U.S.C. § 4 of the Federal Arbitration Act, over objection by the defendant on severability grounds. The defendant argued that its...more
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia recently denied attempts by reinsurers to avoid a suit by moving to have the claims against them dismissed or, in the alternative, seeking to compel arbitration or stay the...more
The background of this case in California federal court is that The Hartford (“Hartford”) issued reinsurance billings to Employers Insurance Company of Wausau (“Wausau”) for settlement payments made to one insured under...more
The California Court of Appeals became the latest court to determine that a common arbitration agreement related to the EquityComp workers’ compensation insurance program and accompanying reinsurance agreements is...more
An Illinois appellate court recently affirmed a lower court decision granting summary judgment and denying defendant insurers’ motion to compel arbitration where Nebraska law governed, reverse preempted the Federal...more
The recent decision of Nielsen Contracting, Inc. v. Applied Underwriters, Inc., 232 Cal.Rptr.3d 282 (Cal. App. 4 Dist. 2018) provides a cautionary tale of the failure to comply with insurance regulatory filing requirements of...more
Odyssey Reinsurance Company (“Odyssey”) has obtained an order compelling John Scannell to produce subpoenaed documents related to Odyssey’s efforts to collect a $3.2 million judgment rendered against Richard and Diane Nagby....more
In 2011, Top’s Personnel entered into a reinsurance agreement with Applied Underwriters Captive Risk Assurance Company (“AUCRA”), and several years later executed a promissory note (“the Note”) in favor of a related entity,...more
The Eastern District of Pennsylvania recently ruled on several discovery motions in a reinsurance dispute between R&Q Reinsurance Company (“R&Q”) and St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company (“St. Paul”) over underlying...more
Applying the doctrine of judicial estoppel, a district court refused to compel arbitration finding that the arbitration clause in a reinsurance agreement was unenforceable under a Virginia statute that voided a mandatory...more
Following up on our recent article, Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Insurers face hidden risks when defending claims and protecting confidential reinsurance information at the same time, published in the August 2017 issue of...more
In an action involving claims under facultative reinsurance for the reinsurance of asbestos risks, the reinsurer sought discovery of documents concerning the allocation of losses among the reinsurers on the program, and...more
In the most recent decision in an ongoing dispute between MF Global Holdings Ltd. and its (re)insurers, the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York ordered Allied World to post a $15 million bond before the...more
A New York court compelled the arbitration of a claim under a reinsurance agreement, rejecting the plaintiff reinsurer’s claim that the reinsurance policy is void because the reinsured issued an underlying insurance policy...more
The case involves a dispute over Utica Mutual Insurance Company’s claims for reinsurance proceeds from Munich Re. One of Munich Re’s defenses in the litigation asserts that Utica “strategically orchestrated a settlement...more
A court has denied a motion to reconsider its decision denying a reinsurer’s (Century Indemnity Co.) motion to compel an insurer (Travelers Casualty and Surety Company) to produce certain documents in a case in which...more
In a discovery dispute following the liquidation of Western Insurance Company (“Western”), a Utah federal district court granted a motion to compel a 30(b)(6) deposition testimony regarding Western’s reinsurance agreements....more
Applied Underwriters Captive Risk Assurance Company appealed from the denial of its motion to compel arbitration in a dispute related to a reinsurance participation contract with South Jersey Sanitation Company. The trial...more
Applying Wisconsin law, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals determined the parties did not have an agreement to arbitrate because, even though their excess/reinsurance agreement contained “follow form” language, and the...more