Catastrophe Claims

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According to the Insurance Information Institute, the cost of homeowners insurance along the East and Gulf coasts has increased by as much as 100% since 2004.  The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) recently reported that regulators and other critics contend that this increase in premiums is due in part to insurers’ use of a “computerized catastrophe model” that assumes climate change resulting in more frequent and more severe hurricanes. 

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Read More Insurers Questioned On Use Of Rate Model Assuming Increase in Weather Related Catastrophes

In a recent trial, a jury awarded $21 million to a grocery store chain and its owner against their insurer for the insurer’s unreasonable failure to pay for Katrina-related damages sustained to several of their stores.  The trial in the case of Marketfare Annunciation, LLC, et al. v. United Fire & Casualty Insurance Com, et al., took place in federal court in Louisiana. 

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Read More Louisiana Jury Awards $21 million Against Insurer for Katrina Claims

A federal class action lawsuit was filed recently against a number of mortgage companies and other lending institutions in the Eastern District of Louisiana.  The Law Offices of Joseph M. Bruno, et al. v. ABN Amro Mortgage Group, Inc., et al., Case No. 08-2762 (E.D.La. May 1, 2008).   (

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Read More Mortgage Lenders Sued in Federal Class Action Lawsuit Questioning Order of Katrina Loss Payments

On May 21, 2008, the Louisiana Supreme Court issued a pro-insurer decision in Landry v. Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Company, enforcing a policy’s explicit loss computation method, under the Louisiana Valued Policy Law (“VPL”).  The court held that an insurer is not obligated to pay the total loss of an insured’s property when damages are caused concurrently by covered and non-covered perils if the policy explicitly contains a loss computation method that differs from that set forth in the VPL. 

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Read More Louisiana Supreme Court Tackles Valued Policy Law

The Mississippi Supreme Court has been asked, for the first time, to interpret the antic-concurrent causation clause in a homeowners’ insurance policy.  An anti-concurrent causation clause (“ACC clause”) generally provides that if a loss arises from a combination of covered and non-covered perils, the entirety of the loss is excluded from coverage. …
Read More Katrina: Mississippi Supreme Court Is Asked to Interpret a Homeowners’ Policy’s Anti-Concurrent Causation Clause

The Supreme Court of Louisiana recently overturned a Katrina-related Louisiana state appellate court decision, and held that an insurer’s flood exclusion was not ambiguous and that coverage could be denied for water damage sustained to an insured’s property on the basis of this exclusion. 

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Read More Louisiana Supreme Court Overturns Prior State Court Decision and Holds that Insurer’s Flood Exclusion is Unambiguous

The Fifth Circuit recently reversed a January 2007 federal district court decision, Broussard v. State Farm, in which Mississippi policyholders, whose home was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, had been awarded their policy limits and $ 1 million in punitive damages against State Farm. …
Read More Fifth Circuit Reverses Katrina Award Against State Farm

The U.S. Attorney’s office has decided not to intervene, at this time, in United States of America, ex rel. Rigsby v. State Farm Ins. Co., a Katrina-related whistleblower lawsuit filed in federal court in Mississippi. …
Read More U.S. Government Chooses Not to Intervene in Hurricane Katrina Whistleblower Lawsuit but Reserves its Rights to Intervene at a Later Date

The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently upheld the dismissal of a claim by two individuals against an insurance agent who sold them renters’ insurance because they failed to file their claim within one-year after they learned about, or should have known, the facts that gave rise to their claim. …
Read More Fifth Circuit Upholds Dismissal of Claims Against Insurance Agent based on Louisiana’s One-Year Statute of Limitations

Last week, the United States Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal by policyholders of the Fifth Circuit’s pro-insurer August 2007 decision that held that various policies’ flood exclusions unambiguously precluded recovery for damages caused by breach of the levees after Hurricane Katrina. 

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Read More Supreme Court Denies Appeal of Katrina Coverage Cases from Louisiana Federal Court