Alexander v. Duong, 2026 WL 3133822 (Okla. 2026) For workers’ compensation carriers, the death of an employee in an accident caused by a negligent third party can produce a particularly frustrating result. This is true in many states. The carrier must pay statutory death benefits to the employee’s dependents, while those same dependents may pursue…
New California decision illustrates why protecting a workers’ compensation lien—and the equally valuable future credit—often requires more than simply notifying the parties of the carrier’s interest. Workers’ compensation subrogation is one of the few areas of insurance recovery in which a carrier can have a perfectly valid statutory right to reimbursement and still walk away…
Woller v. Scottsdale Ins. Co., No. 2024AP500 (Wis. Ct. App. Sept. 29, 2026) (unpublished). In May 2022, 14-year-old Landen Klockziem’s parents let him drive their International 656 tractor approximately 15 miles to school. In the parking lot, he ran over a fellow student’s foot. That student sued and named Scottsdale Insurance, who had issued a…
Laurel Hill Mgmt. Servs. v. La-Z-Boy Inc., 25-1727 (6th Cir. Aug. 19, 2026). Cent. States v. McClain, 25-2727 (7th Cir. Aug. 26, 2026) ERISA preemption is one of the golden tickets in health subrogation. It is this concept that allows ERISA plans to escape the confines of state-law anti-subrogation rules like made whole and common…
Dodge v. Didion Milling, Inc., 2025AP3 (Wis. App. Jul. 30, 2026) (per curiam). **“Per curiam” means the opinion was issued by the court as a whole rather than signed by one judge; this opinion is unpublished and generally cannot be cited as precedent in Wisconsin courts. One of the tradeoffs of Wisconsin’s workers’ compensation system…
California legislators proposed SB 492 to address victim payouts and utility liability regarding wildfires. The proposed legislation initially included a waiver of subrogation. However, an amended version of California SB 492 and the compromise were considerably better for the subrogation industry than the proposal that preceded it; however, the legislation died. Insurance industry organizations provided…
The August 19, 2026 New York Times article, “How Wall St. Profits When Personal Injury Lawsuits Pay Out,” takes a hard look at the rapidly expanding world of litigation financing. Litigation financing can give an injured person short-term help with rent and other expenses while a personal injury claim is pending. But the same arrangement…
For most of the history of automobile subrogation, determining who caused an accident has involved decidedly human questions. Who had the right-of-way? Who was speeding? Who ran the red light? Who failed to maintain a proper lookout? An automobile insurer pays its insured and then pursues the negligent third party responsible for the loss. Human…
Kentucky has not been kind to workers’ compensation subrogation. In our 2023 article, “The Ten Best and Ten Worst States for Subrogating”, we ranked Kentucky as the fifth-worst state in the country. We wrote: Only recently has Kentucky become a bad jurisdiction for workers’ compensation subrogation. It drops to No. 5 thanks to Arkansas being…
In a previous article I wrote, “When Cases Settle: Release Language, Indemnity, Hold Harmless, and Other Concerns” (see HERE), I warned subrogation professionals about the dangers lurking in the seemingly routine release that arrives after a claim is settled. A seven-page “standard release” can transform a simple subrogation recovery into an assumption of indemnity obligations…