Hunton Insurance Recovery Blog

Effective April 1, 2021, Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP has promoted insurance recovery lawyer, Andi DeField, and six other attorneys, to partner.  “Andi has been a superstar in our practice since the day she arrived,” said insurance recovery practice head, Walter Andrews, adding that “Andi’s promotion reflects the incredible hard work she has contributed to the practice and outstanding results she has achieved for our clients over the years.”  A native of Miami, Andi ascended through the ranks at Hunton in its Miami office, joining the firm as a contract lawyer before earning ...

In another pro-policyholder ruling in Delaware, a Delaware Superior Court judge has denied a group of insurers’ application for certification of interlocutory appeal in the long-running D&O dispute, Verizon Communications Inc. et al. v. National Union Fire Insurance Co. of Pittsburgh, PA, et al., C.A. No. N18C-08-086 EMD CCLD (Del. Super. March 16, 2021). The court’s most recent decision arises out of a February 23 ruling that Verizon could recover $24 million in legal fees incurred in defense of a fraudulent transfer lawsuit brought by a bankruptcy trustee. When the insurers’ sought to appeal this interlocutory decision, the court refused, concluding that the benefits of an immediate appeal, if any, do not outweigh the probable costs. The decision will permit the orderly resolution of what the court deemed to be “standard contract law principles,” which the insurers had failed to demonstrate negated coverage.

Hunton insurance attorneys Syed Ahmad, Geoffrey Fehling, and Kevin Small commented on a retailer’s insurance dispute related to COVID-19 in the latest edition of the Recall Roundup, posted on the Hunton Retail Law Resource Blog.

In a setback for retail-policyholders hoping to enforce coverage for losses due to COVID-19 in federal court, a Tennessee district court recently knocked out a complaint filed by a sprawling Nashville establishment seeking coverage under a food contamination provision in its property policy. The court’s opinion dismissing Nashville Underground LLC v. AMCO Insurance Co. is noteworthy due to the great lengths taken to define a policy provision—intended to provide broad coverage for disruption of business due to the suspicion of food contamination—in a way that limits coverage contrary to the reasonable expectations of businesses purchasing policies specifically tailored to protect against actual or suspected contamination.

On March 3, 2021, the Delaware Supreme Court issued a landmark decision holding that Delaware law should be applied in disputes over directors and officers liability (“D&O”) insurance policies sold to companies incorporated in Delaware. RSUI Indem. Co. v. Murdock, et al. No. 154, 2020, C.A. No. N16C-01-104 CCLD (Del. Mar. 3, 2021). The court addressed this and other key issues in the long-running dispute over D&O insurance purchased by Dole Food Company, specifically addressing issues raised by Dole’s eighth-layer excess insurer, RSUI, which provided $10 million coverage excess of $75 million.

The court decided multiple important issues, finding that liability for alleged fraud is insurable under Delaware public policy, RSUI’s Profit/Fraud Exclusion did not bar coverage because there had been no “final adjudication” of fraud, and the “larger sums rule” governed allocation issues. However, among these important rulings, the most significant may be the Supreme Court’s ruling that Delaware governs the interpretation of D&O insurance issued to a company incorporated in Delaware.  The court specifically rejected the insurer’s arguments that California law (which might preclude coverage) should apply under a policy that was purchased and issued in California to a Delaware corporation headquartered in California.

One year into the COVID-19 pandemic, courts have issued hundreds of rulings in COVID-19 business interruption lawsuits, many favoring insurers. Yet those pro-insurer rulings are not based on evidence, much less expert opinion evidence. For insurers, ignorance is bliss.

The adage goes, “the best defense is a good offense.” This appears to be the approach that New York insurance regulators are advocating in response to what they deem “systemic risk[s] that occur when a widespread cyber incident damages many insureds at the same time, potentially swamping insurers with massive losses.” On February 4, 2021, the New York Department of Financial Services (“DFS”), which regulates the business of insurance in New York, has issued guidelines, in the Insurance Circular Letter No. 2 (2021) regarding “Cyber Insurance Risk Framework” (the “Guidelines”), calling on insurers to take more stringent measures in underwriting cyber risks. In the Guidelines, DFS cites the 2020 SolarWinds attack as an example of how managing growing cyber risk is “an urgent challenge for insurers.”

A California state court denied an insurer’s motion to dismiss Goodwill Industries of Orange County’s COVID-19 business-interruption claim after an apparent reassessment of how California’s federal courts have applied (or, rather, misapplied) California precedent to COVID-19 cases. The case is Goodwill Industries of Orange County, California v. Philadelphia Indemnity Insurance Co., No. 30-2020-01169032-CU-IC-CXC (Cal. Super. Ct. Jan. 28, 2021).

The Hunton Insurance Recovery Team recently issued a client alert analyzing how two Ohio federal judges ruled on COVID-19 coverage cases.

As previously reported, an Oklahoma state court recently granted summary judgment to the Cherokee Nation for its COVID-19 business interruption claim. The court has now issued a more substantive opinion, establishing the merits of the Cherokee Nation’s claim and providing yet another blueprint for policyholders seeking to recover COVID-19-related losses under “all risk” commercial property insurance policies.

A South Florida restaurant has asked the US Supreme Court to overturn a federal district court’s ruling that the restaurant is not entitled to coverage under an “all risk” commercial property insurance policy for lost income and extra expenses resulting from nearby road construction. In the underlying coverage action, the policyholder, Mama Jo’s (operating as Berries in the Grove), sought coverage under its all-risk policy for business income losses and expenses caused by construction dust and debris that migrated into the restaurant. Should the Supreme Court grant certiorari, the case will be closely watched by insurers and policyholders alike as an indicator of the scope of coverage available under all-risk policies and whether the principles pertinent to construction dust and debris (at issue in Mama Jo’s claim) have any application to the thousands of pending claims for COVID-19-related business interruption losses pending in the state and federal court systems.