The court dismissed the additional insured’s complaint seeking a defense against a personal injury case. Piece Mgmt., Inc. v. Atlantic Casualty Ins. Co., 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 205589 (S.D. N. Y. Oct. 18, 2025).

The underlying plaintiff, Mustafaa Dais alleged that he was injured when a glass door collapsed onto him as he exited BJ’s Restaurant. Dais sued BJ’s seeking damages for his injuries. He later amended his complaint to add Piece Management, Inc. the property’s management company, and Narway, Inc., the company hired to install the glass door.

Under the subcontract between Piece and Narwy, Narway was required to maintain a general liability policy and to add Piece as an additional insured. Narway obtained the required policy from Atlantic Casualty Insurance Company..

The policy provided that Atlantic had the right, but not the duty, to defend additional insureds. The policy also had an Ongoing Operations provision which included as an insured an “organization shown in the Schedule, but only with respect to liability caused, in whole or in part, by [Narway’s] ongoing operations perfomred for that insured.”

Elsewhere, a Completed Operations provision included as an additional insured the organization “shown in the Schedule, but only with respect to liability for ‘bodily injury’ or ‘property damage’ caused, in whole or in part, by [Narway’s] work . . . performed for that additional insured and included in the ‘products-completed operations hazard.'” Finally, “products-completed operations hazard” was defined to mean “all ‘bodily injury’ . . . occurring away from the premises [Narway] owns or rents and arising out of [Narway’s] . . . work” except for, among other things, “work that has not yet been completed.”

Piece sought a defense but Atlantic refused. Atlantic contended Piece was – at most- an additional insured and the policy made clear that Atlantic had the right, but not the duty , to defend additional insureds.

Piece sued Atlantic seeking a judgment declaring that Atlantic had a duty to defend and indemnify Piece. Atlantic moved to dismiss Piece’s complaint.

Piece argued that it qualified as an insured because the Ongoing Operations provision included as an insured “the organization shown in the Schedule . . . with respect to liability caused, in whole or in party, by [Narway’s] ongoing operations.” According to Piece, Narway was still performing work for Piece when Dais was injured and thus Piece was an insured. Atlantic responded that the Ongoing Operations provision did not apply because the glass door was completed within the meaning of the policy at the time it allegedly collapsed onto Dais.

The court determined it was clear from the pleadings that the glass door was completed within the meaning of hte policy at the time it collapsed onto Dais. Under the policy, Narway’s work was “deemed completed” “[w]hen that part of the work done at a job site has been put to its intended use by any person or organization other than another contractor of subcontractor working on the same project.” Because the door was completed at the time of the injury, the Completed Operations provision, not the Ongoing Operations provision, applied to Piece, an “additional insured.” Therefore, the motion to dismiss as to the duty to defend was dismissed with prejudice.

Seeking a declaration on the duty to indemnify was premature. Therefore, the motion to dismiss the claim for indemnity was dismissed without prejudice.