In the resolution of a coverage dispute between two professional liability insurers, Judge Posner recently had occasion to parse the meaning of the metaphysical phrase “arising from” in an exclusion to claims-made coverage and to limn the teleological contours of claims made coverage.
In James River Ins. Co. v. Kemper Cas. Ins. Co., 2009 WL 3447447 (7th Cir. Oct. 28, 2009), the Seventh Circuit reversed the district court’s holding that a prior-policy exclusion in a professional liability insurance policy did not bar one insurer’s claim for contribution from another insurer for the expense of defending and settling a malpractice claim against a law firm that had been insured in successive policy years by the insurers.
Kemper issued the insured a claims-made professional…
We commented on Wednesday on the recent decision of the SDNY dismissing the rescission action of Milberg LLP’s E&O Insurers. We thus find of proximate interest to learn that William Lerach has been transferred from the federal prison facility in Lampoc, California to a halfway house in Stafford, Arizona. Reuters, Imprisoned lawyer Lerach moves to halfway house, Oct. 14, 2009. Quite predictably, the unrepentant Lerach is now busy blogging on excessive executive pay. Id.
Plaintiffs’ firms can sometimes appear to be vampiric. This thought comes to mind as we read of the recent successes of Milberg, LLP, recently named to the National Law Journal’s eighth annual Plaintiffs’ Hot List. Michael Moline, 2009 Plaintiffs’ Hot List: The Firms to Watch in 2009, Law.com, Oct. 6, 2009.
Readers will doubtless recall that on June 18, 2008, Milberg’s predecessor, Milberg, Weiss, Bershad, Hynes & Lerach, pled guilty to federal criminal charges involving the payment of kickbacks to named plaintiffs in class actions in which the firm served as counsel and agreed to pay a fine of $75 million. Four of its named partners also pleaded guilty to criminal charges—Melvyn Weiss, William Lerach, Steven Schulman, and David Bershad. All…
