Bad Faith Blog

Summary: Progressive Casualty Insurance Company (“Progressive”) issued a Directors and Officers (D&O) Liability Policy to the National Bank of California (“Bank”) on October 30, 2010. The Declarations Page stated that the defense costs were included within the limit on liability. The policy further gave the insured a defense option, but the Bank did not choose the defense option for D&O Liability. The Bank presented six separate claims to Progressive to which Progressive asserted multiple affirmative defenses. The Bank and Progressive then filed multiple partial motions for summary judgments relating to key issues regarding the claims handling. Only two of those complex issues are addressed here.

Summary: Pella Corporation, an Iowa company, was a defendant in two class action cases in Illinois. Those cases alleged that Pella’s windows were defectively designed and manufactured. Liberty Mutual filed a declaratory judgment action in Iowa federal court contending it owed no coverage. The District Court ruled that Liberty Mutual had a duty to reimburse Pella’s defense costs, but denied Pella’s bad faith denial of coverage claim. The Eighth Circuit affirmed the bad faith ruling on appeal.