Early last month a federal court in Indianapolis barred a policyholder from seeking the claims and underwriting files of the defendant carrier’s reinsurer in Indianapolis Airport Auth. v. Travelers Property Cas. Co. of Amer., 2015 WL 1548959, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45123 (S.D. Ind., Apr. 7 2015). Several months ago, the same court also shot down the policyholder’s requests for the insurer’s reserves.
The insured operated the Indianapolis International Airport, and it began construction on the $1 billion Midfield Terminal Project in 2005 and secured a builder’s risk policy from Travelers to cover the work. On January 24, 2007, temporary shoring towers collapsed, damaging the building, disrupting the original construction schedule, and generating claims by consultants and contractors. The policyholder made claim for $13.4 million, but the carrier refused to pay more than $4.19 million. The insured then brought suit, alleging breach of contract and seeking declaratory judgment.
During discovery, the policyholder issued a non-party subpoena to Travelers’ reinsurer, Gen Re, seeking Gen Re’s claims and underwriting files. The insurer responded with a motion to quash and also requested a protective order barring the insured from discovery of any reinsurance documents from any source. On April 7th, Magistrate Judge Tim Baker granted the motion. Read more ›
The insured owned a house and secured a homeowners policy that also extended coverage to his mortgagee. The mortgage company instituted foreclosure proceedings and the policyholder vacated the dwelling, but only after removing fixtures and damaging property to the tune of $246,025. The mortgagee’s subsequent insurance claim was denied, and litigation ensued.
The Keystone State has not seen the dramatic uptick in earthquake activity that has shattered both nerves and property in Oklahoma in recent years. Because of the hydrocarbon-rich Marcellus Shale formation, however, it remains a jurisdiction with more oil and gas drilling than all but a handful of other states, and many homeowners have purchased earthquake endorsements in view of the widely-publicized rise in seismic activity in many such places. 
The property at issue was a former slaughterhouse in Askum that had been vacant since 2005. The policyholder (Brothers Future Holdings) acquired it in 2007 intending to use it for a contract cooking venture, but that business turned out to be stillborn. Property insurance was duly procured, based on an application reciting the structure was “100% owner-occupied.” The mortgagee came on board in August of 2007, and the insurer’s agent was contacted by the mortgage company and issued an “Evidence of Property Insurance” document to the mortgagee indicating that coverage was in place.
Last month, we discussed a recent Texas Supreme Court decision that enforced an anti-concurrent causation (ACC) clause. The month of April also saw a unanimous panel on Iowa’s intermediate level appellate court do the same thing. In 
The policyholder White Mountain owned a hospital in Springerville, Arizona. On May 29, 2011, a blaze was started by an abandoned campfire in the nearby Bear Wallow Wilderness Area. The wildfire ultimately burned 841 square miles in eastern Arizona and western New Mexico, and it led to the temporary evacuation of Springerville. Residents weren’t allowed to return until June 13th, and the hospital itself was closed until the following day.
On the TV show “Friends,” Phoebe Buffay used to entertain patrons at the Central Perk coffee shop with her song “Smelly Cat” (“Smelly cat, smelly cat, what are they feeding you, . . . “). The lyrics would have resonated with Doug and Gayle Mellin, the owners of a condominium in Epping, New Hampshire. After they moved in, the Mellins noticed a cat urine odor coming from a downstairs neighbor’s unit through an open plumbing chase in the kitchen wall. The stench was so severe that the town building inspector directed the couple to relocate temporarily and have the unit professionally remediated, but efforts to do that were unsuccessful. The policyholders vacated permanently after living there only three months.
The policyholder owned The Pointe Apartments – a complex in Galveston, Texas that was heavily damaged when Hurricane Ike came ashore on September 13, 2008. Lexington afforded the primary layer of property insurance protection under a $25 million all-risk contract of insurance that covered dozens of local apartment complexes. Wind was not an excluded peril, and Lexington paid its building consultant’s estimate ($1,278,000) for the wind damage in full.
The April 8, 2015 decision of the California Court of Appeals in 
The case was a proposed class action by a West Liberty, Kentucky dentist whose office was damaged by a tornado and an Owingsville, Kentucky homeowner whose residence was hit by a fire. In both cases, the State Farm policies afforded replacement cost coverage but authorized the carrier to make its initial payment on an ACV basis. In the two cases, the insurer calculated ACV by determining replacement costs and then depreciating both materials and labor. The policyholders argued that labor, unlike construction materials which logically age and wear and tear, was not subject to depreciation.