Lawyers file flurry of Rita-related lawsuits in southeast Texas
I-Fans,
ITP faithful will find the above headline familiar. The AP story in the Beaumont Enterprise dwells on a two-year statute of limitations for contract disputes in Texas. Should the clock start at the date of the storm or the date of insurance denial or none action? The answer is the latter. The first scenario gives insurers even more incentive to drag out the process as long as possible.
And even my insurer pals, I think, by this point will acknowledge, that this they will do.
But of course the larger point is that in two weeks 300 people who probably have never sued anyone in their lives are trooping into court to a small Texas hamlet to sue a giant corporation. Can 300 Texans be wrong? Sure. Are they?
War Eagle says: “I doubt it.”
They are probably as wrong as the Websters, who live in Bay St. Louis, Miss., two states away. Last week, a federal jury found that they were right in their lawsuit that alleged USAA wrongfully denied their $1.7 million claim. And that was just for structure. The next phase was to deal with contents.
At the conclusion of the trial, U.S. District Judge L.T. Senter Jr. will be responsible for calculating how much money USAA owes the Websters, based on the jury’s verdicts.
Later, the trial would move to the punitive phase to determine whether USAA acted in bad faith.
The Websters also are seeking unspecified punitive damages for the company’s alleged bad faith, plus attorney’s fees and expenses. But the request for punitive damages couldn’t be considered until later in the trial.
USAA settled before it got that far.
ITP asks: Is anyone on this list keeping score in Louisiana and Mississippi? If so, can you let me know how the cases that have gone to trial have resulted? Thanks!
And thanks to John.