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On June 8, 2011, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced the appointment of Assemblyman Jonathan Bing to serve as Special Deputy Superintendent of the New York Liquidation Bureau, an agency tasked with protecting policyholders and creditors of insurance companies that have gone bankrupt.  Bing steps in as the successor to Dennis J. Hayes, who was appointed to the position in September 2009. …
Read More Governor Cuomo Appoints Assemblyman Jonathan Bing to Head New York Liquidation Bureau

The process of high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing, or “hydrofracking,” was first used commercially by Halliburton in 1949. It involves injecting millions of gallons of water, mixed with sand and chemicals, deep into the ground at high pressure in order to break up dense shale rock formations and release trapped natural gas to the surface.  The risks associated with hydrofracking, however, are numerous and diverse, affecting every stage of the process from transporting and drilling to waste storage and disposal. …
Read More “The Risks of Hydrofracking” and “Insurance for Hydrofracking”

In Arash Shipping Enterprises Company Limited v Groupama Transport, the Court of Appeal considered the impact of Council Regulation (EU) No.961/2010 (the Regulation) on a contract of insurance. The Regulation aimed to impose restrictive measures against Iran “with a view to supporting the resolution of all outstanding concerns regarding Iran’s development of sensitive technologies in support of its nuclear and missile programmes“. …
Read More UK: Court of Appeal Considers Impact of Iran Sanctions Order on Contract of Insurance

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled that the state’s workers’ compensation statute does not bar a lawsuit by a subcontractor’s employee against the general contractor, even if the employee previously collected workers’ compensation benefits from the general contractor’s insurer.  See Wentworth v. Henry C. Becker Custom Bldg., No. SJC-10806 (May 23, 2011). …
Read More Massachusetts High Court: Workers’ Comp Bar Does Not Apply to Subcontractor Employee’s Suit Against General Contractor

EAPD’s Privacy and Data Protection Group is pleased to announce that the newest edition of its White Paper, “Everyone’s Nightmare: Privacy and Data Breach Risks,” has been prepared. The paper discusses legal and regulatory data security and breach notification developments, exposures presented by data breaches, recent major breaches and court decisions, and lines of insurance potentially impacted. …
Read More Everyone’s Nightmare: Privacy and Data Breach Risks

The U.S. Supreme Court recently denied a reinsurer’s request to hear a dispute that concerned, among other things, whether a cedent’s party-appointed arbitrator should be disqualified from serving in a subsequent arbitration involving related parties and issues. …
Read More Supreme Court Denies Reinsurer’s Petition to Hear Arbitrator Disqualification Case

Business partners BHP Billiton Ltd. and Chesapeake Energy Corp. were recently hit with a series of proposed class actions in Arkansas alleging their hydraulic fracturing (“hydrofracking”) operations and compression stations are contaminating nearby groundwater, soil, water wells and air as well as causing dangerous seismic activity. …
Read More Hydrofracking: Recent Flurry of Class Actions in Arkansas

As part of a coordinated national investigation, California state insurance regulators held a hearing on May 23, 2011 to probe one particular life insurer’s claims settlement practices. Just as in the Florida hearing described in our May 20, 2011 advisory, at issue was the life insurer’s use of the Social Security Death Master File (DMF), a publically-available database containing information on deceased Americans. …
Read More Client Advisory – California Announces Investigation of Life Insurers’ Use of Social Security Death Master List and Compliance With Unclaimed Property Laws