Insurance | Virginia Lawyers Weekly

Woman wins $4K on bad faith claim

By Paul Fletcher
Published: March 26, 2012
Tags: General District Courts, Insurance

A Hampton Roads woman who brought a bad-faith claim against her insurance company has won full payment of her medical bills, along with attorney’s fees and $4,000 in punitives.
Virginia Beach lawyer Sandra L. Sampson said her client, a woman named Kellee Kraft, was hurt when her minivan was totalled in a T-bone collision. Kraft incurred [...]

No Med Pay for Work-Related Injury

By Deborah Elkins
Published: March 7, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Justice Lawrence L. Koontz Jr., Supreme Court of Virginia

The Virginia Supreme Court says a police officer who suffered neck and shoulder injuries when a motorist rear-ended a county sheriff’s car in which the officer was a passenger cannot collect medical payments under his personal auto liability policy which has an exclusion for injuries covered under workers’ compensation law.
Plaintiff officer’s personal policy contained a [...]

Single-vehicle accident took lives of three family members – $965,000 Settlement

By Virginia Lawyers Weekly
Published: March 5, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Loudoun County Circuit Court, Wrongful Death

This wrongful death case stemmed from a family tragedy in which three Purcellville residents were killed and four others were injured in a single-vehicle crash. The accident occurred on Route 55 near Front Royal on Sept. 5, 2010, when the SUV left the road, over-corrected and drove over an embankment into a tree. All passengers [...]

Court Should Hear Auto-Accident Dec Action

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 29, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Judge M. Hannah Lauck, U.S. District Court - Eastern District

In this dispute over insurance coverage for an employer-owned vehicle an employee was driving when she struck another vehicle and a man was fatally injured, a Richmond U.S. District magistrate judge recommends denying the motion filed by the employer’s insurance carrier to dismiss this declaratory judgment action.
Plaintiff administrator of the estate of William Horner seeks [...]

School Board Policy Covers Attorney’s Fees

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 29, 2012
Tags: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Insurance, Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

An Albemarle County school board’s failure to pay its school bus drivers and transportation assistants overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act was a “wrongful act” under the school board’s commercial insurance policy, and the policy does not cover wage payments but should cover liquidated damages and attorney’s fees, the 4th Circuit says.
The district [...]

Widow Gets No Benefits Under ‘Aircraft’ Exclusion

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 24, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Judge Norman K. Moon, U.S. District Court - Western District

A widow whose husband died in a crash of a “light-sport aircraft” cannot collect benefits under the husband’s accidental death and dismemberment policy, which excludes benefits for injury caused by or resulting from flight in an aircraft, except as a passenger on a regularly scheduled commercial airline; the Lynchburg U.S. District Court grants judgment to [...]

No Stacking of UIM Coverage

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 16, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Judge Robert G. Doumar, U.S. District Court - Eastern District

In this case in which an insured seeks to “stack” UIM auto liability coverage, a Norfolk U.S. District Court finds no ambiguity in decedent’s UIM policy that will allow the court to “stack” coverage on three vehicles insured under the policy, and grants summary judgment for defendant carrier.
The Supreme Court of Virginia declined to accept [...]

Unsigned Cancellation Effective When Mailed

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 13, 2012
Tags: Insurance, Judge Dennis Dohnal, U.S. District Court - Eastern District

Hearing the matter by consent of the parties under 28 USC§636(c)(1), the Richmond U.S. District Court magistrate judge grants summary judgment for a life insurer that mailed unsigned notices according to the policy terms cancelling a “key man” insurance policy for nonpayment of premium.
Insured business maintained a “key man” life insurance policy on an employee [...]

Carrier Covers Part of Lead-Paint Judgment

By Deborah Elkins
Published: February 8, 2012
Tags: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Insurance, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III

In determining insurance coverage for a Baltimore child who won a $850,000 judgment for lead paint injuries against two defendants – a realty company and the property owner that bought the house in which the child lived – the 4th Circuit says the realty company’s insurance contract requires the carrier to pay 40 percent of [...]

Carrier Must Defend Under ‘Garage Operations’ Clause

By Deborah Elkins
Published: December 15, 2011
Tags: Insurance, Judge Anthony J. Trenga, U.S. District Court - Eastern District

Although the driver of a car owned by Cowles Nissan was intoxicated when he struck and killed a pedestrian, an Alexandria U.S. District Court predicts the Virginia Supreme Court would interpret an insurance policy’s “garage operations provision” to require the insurance carrier on the owner’s commercial garage policy to defend the state court wrongful death [...]

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