A commentary on insurance coverage issues in Hawaii and beyond
An ambiguous endorsement on the scope of coverage for additional insureds meant the insurer had a duty to defend. See Ames Const., Inc. v. Intermountain Indus., Inc., 2010 U.S. LEXIS 41588 (D. Mont. April 28, 2010).
Ames was the general contractor on a project to expand and upgrade the Missoula Wastewater Treatment…
Determining the "Cost of Replacement" of the insureds' home was before the court in Nunez v Allstate Ins Co., 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 8362 (5th Cir. April 20, 2010).
The insureds' home in Louisiana was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. The insureds received flood policy limits of $75,000 for structural damage and $30,000…
Ever since the Ninth Circuit made an Erie guess in Burlington Ins. Co. v. Oceanic Design & Constr. Inc., 383 F.3d 940 (9th Cir. 2004), that the Hawai’i appellate courts would find that construction defects do not constitute an occurrence under a CGL policy, coverage practitioners have waited for an answer. Today, the Hawai`i Intermediate Court of Appeals…
The insurer's right to compel an appraisal under the policy was addressed in In Re Capitol County Mut. Fire Ins. Co., 2010 Tex. App. LEXIS 3060 (Tex. Ct. App. April 27, 2010).
Following Hurricane Ike, the insured submitted a claim for damage to her home to the insurer, Capitol County. After determining the…
Brown was injured when a passenger in a car on Kauai. See Brown v. Progressive Direct Ins. Co., 2010 Haw. App. LEXIS 211 (Haw. Ct. App. May 5, 2010). The driver of the vehicle in which Brown rode was uninsured. The driver of the second vehicle involved in the accident fled the accident scene.
At…
The recently completed session of the Hawaii Legislature enacted six insurance-related bills. We summarize each below.
SB 2017 – Insurance Claims Adjusters; Crop Insurance
The bill allows a claims adjuster who adjusts only workers' compensation claims or crop insurance claims to take an examination approved by the Risk Management Agency of the United…
Whether an exclusion for coverage of bodily injury to an employee of "the insured" applied to an additional insured was the issue in James McHugh Construction Co. v. Zurich Am Ins. Co., 2010 Ill. App. LEXIS 318 (Ill. Ct. App. April 13, 2010).
McHugh, the general contractor, hired JMS Electric, Inc. to…
Check out today's postover at hawaiioceanlaw.com where my Damon Key colleague, Mark Murakami, discusses a Katrina-related case in which the insured refused to accept the insurer's choice of defense counsel. The choice was risky because the Second Circuit relieved the insurer of having to pay defense costs.
The following guest post on surety bonds is provided by Kevin Kaiser of Surety Bonds.com, a nationwide bonding agency dedicated to educating people about surety bonds through their Surety Bond Education Program. (http://www.suretybonds.com/edu/). Five questions about bonds follow and are answered by Kevin.
1) What is a Surety Bond and How is…
The issue in Fabozzi v. Lexington Ins. Co., 2010 U.S. App. LEXIS 7040 (2nd Cir. April 6, 2010), was whether the limitations period for suit against the insurer was triggered when damage to the insureds' home occurred or when all the conditions precedent to filing suit had been met.
When first issuing…
