Surfside Condo Collapse: A 360-Degree Insurance Coverage Analysis

October 26th, 2021|Categories: HB Emerging Law Notes, HB Tort Notes, Journal on Emerging Issues in Litigation|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , |

Surfside Condo Collapse: A 360-Degree Insurance Coverage Analysis Abstract The horrific and fatal collapse of Champlain Towers South in the summer of 2021 not only shook the ground in Surfside, Florida, but it brought into question the integrity of structures everywhere. If professionals in the construction, real estate, and building management industries were relaxed about signs of structural decay before, they are not anymore. The insurance industry also has reasons to worry, as potentially responsible players turn to their policies to defend or indemnify them for claims for accidents causing losses including from property damage, personal injury, or death. In this article the authors evaluate the factors that are addressed when coverage determinations are made, as well as the various types of policies that come into play. Authors Allen R. Wolff (awolff@andersonkill.com) is a shareholder in Anderson Kill’s New York office, where he concentrates on the intersection of construction litigation and insurance recovery. Allen is co-chair of the firm’s Construction Industry Practice group and Corporate and Commercial Litigation Practice group. He advises and represents policyholders—building owners, developers, contractors, retailers, municipalities, financial institutions, hospitality businesses, condominium associations, and tenants’ associations—in a range of insurance coverage disputes. Allen’s colleagues, Ethan W. Middlebrooks (emiddlebrooks@andersonkill.com) and Jason Kosek (jkosek@andersonkill.com), are also attorneys in Anderson Kill’s New York office. They also concentrate on insurance [...]

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To Pay or Not to Pay: Does Your Insurance Policy Cover Ransomware Losses? | By Pamela Hans | Anderson Kill

October 26th, 2021|Categories: Cyber Risk, Cyber Risk Litigation, Emerging Litigation & Risk, HB Emerging Law Notes, HB Risk Notes, Journal on Emerging Issues in Litigation|Tags: , , , , , , , , |

To Pay or Not to Pay: Does Your Insurance Policy Cover Ransomware Losses? Abstract Ransomware attacks are a rapidly growing threat against organizations. Paying ransom demands is a risky proposition and may even lead to sanctions against the targeted company. Either way, the damage to a company’s operation and integrity can be cripplingly severe. Should a company suffer losses from cyber extortion, its insurance company will be one of the resources it turns to for relief. But with cyber coverage increasingly out of reach for some, policyholders may find coverage in more traditional coverages. In this article, the author evaluates the potential for coverage under several policy types, and underscores the importance of understanding policy language, the relevant law, and the potential regulatory ramifications of meeting ransom demands. Author Pamela D. Hans (phans@andersonkill.com) is the managing shareholder of Anderson Kill’s Philadelphia office. Her practice concentrates on insurance coverage exclusively on behalf of policyholders. Pam is also a member of the firm’s COVID Task Group and Cyber Recovery Group. About The Journal on Emerging Issues in Litigation is a co-production of HB, Fastcase, and Law Street Media. You can also hear the complementary (and complimentary) Emerging Litigation Podcast wherever podcasts appear. For questions, contact Tom Hagy, Editor in Chief, at Editor@LitigationConferences.com.

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Susan E. Brice and Vince Angermeier on Causation in Toxic Torts

May 20th, 2021|Categories: HB Emerging Law Notes, HB Risk Notes, HB Tort Notes, Journal on Emerging Issues in Litigation|Tags: , , , , , |

Susan E. Brice and Vince Angermeier on Causation in Toxic Torts Abstract Concepts of “substantial factors,” “any exposure,” and “de minimis” contact have long-supported claims brought by toxic tort plaintiffs against manufacturers. They have furthered tort actions against defendants based on the “cumulative expo-sure” theory, particularly in the asbestos arena, even when a single fiber could not be connected to a specific defendant. But a 2017 Seventh Circuit decision dealing with Illinois law is part of a trend toward tightening up these standards. This article discusses the various cases on this threshold issue as the authors ponder whether this is a movement that needs some pushing. Authors Susan E. Brice (sb@nijmanfranzetti.com) is a partner at Nijman Franzetti, LLP. She has litigated state and federal disputes and has counseled clients on complicated scientific issues arising in environmental law, toxic torts, and product liability. Susan works with scientists on matters in the fields of genomics, toxicology, and epidemiology in industries such as chemical manufacturing, energy production, food, agriculture, and real estate. Vince Angermeier (va@nijmanfranzetti.com) is Of Counsel at Nijman Franzetti, LLP, where he concentrates his work on CERCLA, EPCRA, RCRA, and Clean Water Act matters, a practice enhanced by his environmental engineering experience. Vince has assisted on civil litigation, administrative rulemakings, regulatory and compliance matters involving water, solid waste, and [...]

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Mass Tort Emotional & Psychological Claims

October 27th, 2020|Categories: Featured On-Demand, Torts-On-Demand-CLE|Tags: , , , , , , , , |

Emotional & Psychological Claims in Multi-Plaintiff Toxic Tort Litigation: What attorneys need to know about the scientific and medical aspects of these injuries.  On-Demand | Recorded October 27th, 2020 ON DEMAND WEBINAR REGISTRATION Emotional injury claims often arise in toxic torts due to exposure to asbestos, mold, carbon monoxide, and environmental contamination, to name a few. And now, as large swaths of the nation are often engulfed in flame, what physical and emotional effect might manifest from prolonged smoke inhalation? Determining the validity of these injuries and any causal connection is difficult. It requires careful study by truly qualified experts often from various disciplines. When psychological harm exists, it can be debilitating. There is much an attorney should know when wading into these types of claims. How often is there a legitimate injury? What different types of injuries are there? What should attorneys know when working with or challenging psychological experts? How is causation proven or disproven? How are damages determined? Join our panel comprising a forensic neuropsychologist, an industrial and occupational physician, a forensic psychiatrist, and an experienced mass tort practitioner as they share their insights and experiences. Key Points Understanding the different types of psychological injury claims. Understanding the differences between objective injuries that are easy to identify and distinguish, versus subjective injuries such [...]

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Heavy Metals in SFO Bay

October 16th, 2020|Categories: HB Tort Notes|Tags: , , , , |

Legal Writer Law Street Media San Francisco Baykeeper Sues Aviation Part Manufacturer Over Heavy Metal Pollution Reposted with permission of Law Street Media and Fastcase. On Tuesday in the Northern District of California, plaintiff San Francisco Baykeeper filed a civil action against defendants Allied Engineering & Production Corp., Allied Land Co. (collectively Allied), and Stone Boatyard to rectify the alleged past and ongoing contamination of canal shoreline near the San Francisco Bay. The plaintiff brings the suit under the private attorney general provision, asserting rights on behalf of the public against the defendants for supposedly dumping metal shavings in the Oakland Inner Harbor Tidal Canal in violation of the law. Baykeeper is an environmental non-profit organization with approximately 3,500 members who live and recreate in and around the San Francisco Bay area. The organization’s mission is “to defend San Francisco Bay from the biggest threats and hold polluters accountable to create healthier communities and help wildlife thrive.” It monitors and investigates pollution as part of its efforts to ensure that the bay is clean and safe for recreation. Defendant Allied Engineering operated a machine shop from 1951 to about 2011, located in Alameda, Calif., on a property that Allied Land owned. The machine shop manufactured aviation industry components and stored hazardous materials, hydraulic oils, [...]

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James Beck on the Drug & Device Law Blog: Something Both Sides Should Agree On (re Class Actions)

September 21st, 2020|Categories: HB Emerging Law Notes, HB Tort Notes|Tags: , , , , , |

Senior Life Sciences Policy Analyst Reed Smith LLP Drug & Device Law Blog: Something Both Sides Should Agree On (re Class Actions) We’ll be very clear – as we have before:  We don’t like most class actions.  Indeed, if given our druthers, we would abolish Rule 23, as it applies to class actions for damages, altogether.  But that’s not in the offing anytime soon.  Today, we offer a class action decision that we think both sides, us on the defense and those on the plaintiffs side, can agree on, excluding only those responsible for the problem. In Pearson v. Target Corp., 968 F.3d 827 (7th Cir. 2020), the court came up with one possible solution to the class action “objector problem.” What’s that? Well, once a class action settles (as most do), all too often “objectors” come out of the woodwork.  While these objectors purport to assert the interests of the class, usually, all they want is money to make them go away.  Or, as described in Pearson: We address here a recurring problem in class-action litigation known colloquially as “objector blackmail.”  The scenario is familiar to class-action litigators on both offense and defense.  A plaintiff class and a defendant submit a proposed settlement for approval by the district court.  A few class members object to the settlement but [...]

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Washington AG Sues Juul, Minnesota Judge Tosses RJR’s Suit to Overturn City’s Flavored Tobacco Ban, Verus Reports

September 14th, 2020|Categories: HB Emerging Law Notes, HB Tort Notes|Tags: , , , , , |

Manager of Research Services Verus LLC klavin@verusllc.com 609-466-0427 Photo by Rubén Bagüés on Unsplash Litigation Update: Vaping and Flavored Tobacco Products Lawsuits The Washington state attorney general has filed a lawsuit in King County Superior Court against Juul Inc., alleging that the company knowingly targeted minors in its marketing campaign on social media in an effort to push its products on young consumers. In the suit, Attorney Bob Ferguson claimed that in using young models, brightly colored ads and candy-flavored vaping juice, Juul violated Washington state’s consumer protection laws and failed to meet state tobacco product licensing regulations which would make the sales of the company’s e-cigarettes unlawful between August 2016 and April 2018 .... In another tobacco-related case, U.S. District Judge Patrick J. Schiltz tossed out R.J. Reynolds’ lawsuit against Edina, MN over the city’s ban on flavored tobacco products.  The company had claimed that Edina had overstepped its authority with a ban that was aimed at curbing vaping by younger consumers. In his ruling, Judge Schiltz wrote that the ban fell under a provision of the federal tobacco laws granting local governments the authority to regulate the sale of certain products .... Read more at VerusLLC.com.

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Progress of Roundup Settlement in Question, Verus Reports

September 2nd, 2020|Categories: HB Tort Notes|Tags: , , , , , , , , |

Manager of Research Services Verus LLC klavin@verusllc.com 609-466-0427 Progress of Roundup Settlement in Question Judge Would Likely Not Have Agreed to a Stay Had He Known About the Contingency On August 27, plaintiffs’ counsel in the multi-district litigation involving Monsanto and its widely used weed killer Roundup, advised the court that parent company Bayer AG appeared to be going back on the settlement agreement announced in June. At that time, the company had agreed to settle about 75% of the 125,000 claims filed by plaintiffs alleging that their non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma was linked to Roundup use; the settlement was for an estimated $10 billion. At the hearing, Judge Vince Chhabria advised that he had received confidential letters from a number of plaintiffs’ counsel with cases pending in the MDL who were concerned that Bayer AG was going back on the settlement, noting that the company had terminated settlement term sheets and refused to execute master service agreements that would finalize their settlements; Bayer conceded that there were currently no final agreements. Bayer did advise Judge Chhabria that about 667 of the cases currently pending in the MDL had been resolved, a figure that the judge noted was only a fraction of the 4,000 currently filed.  The judge also pointed to Bayer’s June 24 announcement of the settlement, [...]

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NJ Judge Overstepped in Striking Talc Plaintiff Experts, Verus Reports

August 21st, 2020|Categories: HB Tort Notes|Tags: , , , |

Manager of Research Services Verus LLC klavin@verusllc.com 609-466-0427 Judge Abused Discretion in Striking Expert Evidence, NJ Appellate Court Finds Reverses 2016 Summary Judgment in Ovarian Cancer Cases On August 5, a three judge panel from the New Jersey state appeals court reversed a 2016 summary judgment granted in favor of defendants, talc manufacturer Johnson & Johnson and talc miner Imerys Talc America in cases brought by two women who allege J&J’s talc products caused their ovarian cancer. In its opinion, the panel ruled that Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Nelson C. Johnson abused his discretion by serving as the fact finder in deciding the credibility of the plaintiffs’ experts’ opinions instead of merely assessing whether the doctors’ opinions were based on sound scientific methodology. The trial judge acknowledged that the experts, Dr. Graham Colditz and Dr. Daniel Cramer, were qualified but opined that their scientific studies and evidence were narrow and shallow, showing a preference for cohort studies and their larger sample sizes over the case studies relied on by the experts.  In overturning the ruling by the trial court and discussing the studies cited by Colditz and Cramer, the appeals court stated that those studies satisfied the criteria outlined in the Federal Judicial Center’s Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence and also noted that size and [...]

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Settlement Psychology: Who is in Control? Homer Simpson or Mr. Spock? | Complimentary Webinar

April 1st, 2019|Categories: Emerging-On-Demand-CLE, Featured On-Demand, Torts-On-Demand-CLE|Tags: , , , , , , , |

Settlement Psychology Who's in charge? Homer Simpson or Mr. Spock? Cognitive obstacles to finding common ground. Complimentary On-Demand Webinar From HB! 1 CLE credit CLE questions? CLE@LitigationConferences.com Questions for speakers? Questions@LitigationConferences.com SPEAKERS Jeff Trueman Mediator / Negotiator John Philip Miller Baltimore City Circuit Judge (ret.) This course is also available via the West LegalEdcenter. Improve your negotiation strategy and outcomes. Mediator, arbitrator and settlement conference neutral Jeff Trueman says the lawyer’s mind can sometimes play tricks on them when it comes time to settle a claim. “The central question on the minds of counsel, their clients, and insurance professionals in civil litigation is, of course, ‘What’s the case worth?’ For mature torts there is enough historical settlement and verdict data exist for counsel to argue why a particular case should or should not fit within a certain settlement range. In the midst of these discussions, the human brain plays tricks on us. For example, litigators sometimes assume that their trial experience can determine how jurors will negotiate with one another and resolve factual discrepancies after closing arguments. This assumption is a ‘heuristic’ – a cognitive shortcut called attributional error or illusion of control.” Backed by his decades of psychological and economic sciences research, Trueman says there is a lot of room [...]

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Verdict & Settlement Lien Resolution Webinar | 3/6/2019

February 22nd, 2019|Categories: Uncategorized|Tags: , , , , , |

DATE: March 6, 2019 TIME: 4 p.m. EDT; 3 p.m. CDT; 2 p.m. MDT; 1 p.m. PDT PLACE: Your computer or mobile device PRICE: $247 -- but just $197 through Feb. 28 with promotion code JVRA50 GROUPS ARE GOOD: Registering qualifies you to multiple attendees at your location. CLE: 1 credit Please send CLE questions to CLE@LitigationConferences.com SPEAKERS: Franklin Solomon Solomon Law Firm     Brett Newman Newman Settlement Services Group       Tort Settlement Lien Resolution: Beyond Traditional Medicare and Medicaid Issues to ERISA, FEHBA, Medicare Advantage, VA, Tricare and Medicare Set-Asides. Take this highly practical course with two deeply experienced practitioners who share insights on issues that impact the cases on your desk today. Learn about the newest case law, agency positions and litigation tactics affecting health and disability plan reimbursement claims, including how to protect your clients and your practice in this rapidly developing area. Our speakers will discuss: Medicare Advantage Plans Federal Employees Health Benefits Act (FEHBA) Plans Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) Claims Medicare set-asides TRICARE Veterans Administration Claims Speaker Bios Franklin P. Solomon | Solomon Law Firm A graduate of Rutgers University School of Law at Camden, Franklin Solomon is based in Cherry Hill, NJ, with a practice focused on evaluation, litigation and resolution of healthcare “liens” and reimbursement claims. Franklin represents personal [...]

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PFOA: Science & Litigation | 11/15/2018

October 21st, 2018|Categories: HB Tort Notes, Torts-On-Demand-CLE|Tags: , , , |

  DATE: Nov. 15, 2018 TIME: 2 p.m. EDT; 1 p.m. CDT; 12 p.m. MDT; 11 a.m. PDT PLACE: Your computer or mobile device PRICE: $197* per dial-in site *Price is good through Oct. 31. After that it's $247. GROUPS ARE GOOD: Registering qualifies you to multiple attendees at your location. CLE: 1 credit Please send CLE questions to CLE@LitigationConferences.com speakers Michael Dourson, Ph.D., DABT, FATS, FSRA Director of Science Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment (TERA) Register now and get: Access for multiple colleagues at your location. Practical insights from a board-certified toxicologist. A through and informative PowerPoint presentation for later reference. Answers to your questions via live chat. CLE credit. And more! PFOA Toxicology: What's a Safe Level for the Environment? What toxic tort and environmental attorneys need to know about this ubiquitous compound.  Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) has been described as more toxic than methyl mercury. Yet not all organizations tasked with developing safe-dose levels agree on the best approach for PFOA, resulting in recommended levels that are more than 100-times apart. Differences in these recommended safe-dose levels result in cleanup costs that vary by billions of dollars. Background Environmental contamination with PFOA has been known for some time. In the early 2000s safe doses in drinking water were considered to be in the range of 30-to-50 parts per billion.  Recent safe-dose assessments by [...]

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