The Connecticut Law Tribune recently published an article by Gordon & Rees Hartford office managing partner Dennis O. Brown and associate Joseph R. Geoghegan. The article appeared in the publication’s Insurance Law Special Section.
In the article, titled “End of the Line for 'Procedural Bad Faith' in Connecticut,” Brown and Geoghegan discussed Capstone Building Corp. v. American Motorists Insurance Co., a 2013 Connecticut Supreme Court opinion that shut the door on procedural bad-faith causes of action.
“The Connecticut Supreme Court has finally shed the illuminating radiance of reason and respect for traditional rules of contract to dispose of the shadowy notion that insurance companies that have fully complied with their policies can still be sued for how they acted toward a policyholder seeking money for an uncovered claim,” Brown and Geoghegan wrote.
“The Connecticut Supreme Court's decision earlier this year ended years of speculation among practitioners, legal writers, and federal judges in Connecticut, who have all tried to read the tea leaves and predict whether Connecticut would join the very small number of states to adopt this relatively new theory of recovery. Many in the insurance industry were concerned over decisions from the federal bench here predicting that Connecticut would align itself with those states that have recognized ‘procedural bad faith,’ subjecting claims professionals to seemingly boundless discovery obligations and leaving all of their actions open to second-guessing even where there was no real dispute that coverage for a matter was properly denied. With the high court's decision this year, those doubts have been laid to rest,” the authors noted.
Brown, a member of Gordon & Rees’s Insurance and Commercial Litigation Practice Groups, guides insurance and corporate clients in resolving complex contentious matters. He has a demonstrated ability to prevail in trials addressing difficult issues such as sophisticated scientific, medical, economic and accounting disputes. Brown has provided advice and litigation defense on coverage issues to U.S.- and London-based insurers. His experience includes title insurance coverage litigation involving complex matters such as the contentious transfer of properties by closely-held businesses that were subject to family ownership disputes. Brown also has supervised the defense of hundreds of product liability, property, toxic substances and asbestos claims.
Geoghegan is a member of the Insurance and Privacy & Data Security Practice Groups. His practice focuses on insurance coverage analysis, defense of insurance bad-faith and coverage litigation, data security compliance and data breach response, and commercial and employment litigation. He provides coverage analysis on a range of insurance policies, including commercial general liability, commercial property, errors and omissions, employment practices, and cyber risk.
To read the full article, click here.