Trial lawyers are filing bad faith class action suits against insurance companies across the country in rapid fashion based on alleged wrongful depreciation of labor costs in their calculation of Actual Cash Value (ACV) in property loss claims. They smell blood in the water given the turmoil and lack of clear guidance from state to…
Certain 2011 to 2021 Kia and 2015 to 2021 Hyundai vehicles were designed, manufactured, and sold without an electronic immobilizer found in over 95% of other vehicles. As such, these automobiles are prone to theft. Thieves typically break a back window to avoid alarms, expose the steering column, and fit a USB-A plug into the…
According to the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA), each day last year, twenty people were struck and killed by cars. Nearly 8,000 pedestrians were killed by vehicles in 2021 – an increase of 11.5%. This represents both an alarming public safety trend and a growing concern for the insurance industry. A 2018 Governors Highway Safety…
Connelly v. Main St. Am. Group, 2023 WL 152540 (S.C. 2023) South Carolina’s Exclusive Remedy Rule has prevented an employee from collecting $350,000 in uninsured motorist benefits for injuries she sustained in an automobile accident she was in while a passenger in a vehicle owned and driven by a co-employee. Stephany Connelly and a co-worker…
Earlier in my career I handled a subrogation case involving a brand-new vehicle which was lightly tapped from the rear by a careless driver. The damage to the vehicle was very minimal, yet the vehicle was declared a total loss by my client because its frame had been “jiggled” and the cost to repair the…
Grothe v. Kushnivich, 521 P.3d 228 (Wash. App. 2022) One by one, states have begun to recognize a vehicle owner’s third-party claim for residual diminished value damage, or “stigma damage”, which is the loss of value of an automobile that remains after it is completely and professionally repaired. It is the loss of value that…
“It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” — Mark Twain One insurance company – State Farm – has referred to dog bites as a “serious public health problem.” In 2018 alone, one carrier paid $90 million in claims on roughly 3,500 dog bite incidents. According…
4.07[10] Made Whole Doctrine Until recently, the Made Whole Doctrine had not been applied outside the context of a bankruptcy proceeding in Connecticut.[1] However, the Connecticut Supreme Court has given us a clue as to how it will treat this issue in the future. It has ruled that while a right of true contractual subrogation…
A huge segment of America’s service economy involves flexible, temporary, part-time, or freelance jobs—frequently involving professional employer organizations (PEO’s) or employee leasing companies. The “gig economy” is the labor market that relies on temporary and part-time positions filled by independent contractors, leased employees, and freelancers, rather than full-time permanent employees. Threading the needle of workers’…
Amy Alexander, et al. v. Nam Duong and Sentinel Insurance Company, Case No. 120,320 (Okla. App. December 2, 2022) Oklahoma’s workers’ compensation laws have endured a long and tortured constitutional tug-of-war between trial lawyers and business advocates/subrogation professionals. In 2011, Oklahoma completely overhauled its workers’ compensation laws, entitling the new legislation the “Workers’ Compensation Code.”[1]…