Defendant's Insurance Co. goes bankrupt

[AmosMoses]

What is the name of your state? Loiuisiana

If the defendant in a lawsuit for invasion of privacy, slander, trespass and "false light" claims is a private investigation firm, and the original petition names the firm, a specific employee, and nominees for the insurance companies of both as defendants, what happens when the insurance company of the firm goes bankrupt during the process? Who would stand to "lose" IF the case is won by the plaintiff? i.e., If a judgement is awarded to the plaintiff, and the insurance company is legally bankrupt, would the PI firm them be responsible for the award and then THEY have to try to get thier money back from this insolvent company, or could the PI firm not have to pay because they were insured in good faith at the time? What I mean is, if the insurance company is tits up, does the PI firm have to pay the award, or does the plaintiff simply lose out, or have to line up with the other "creditirs" to try to get some portion of a payment?

 

[stephenk]

if a defendant is now uninsured you have to determine if the defendant has assets to pay any judgment that would be entered against them. Think of the PI firm as being uninsured since the beginning, would you have gone after them?

The PI firm would not be responsible to pay the portion of the judgment attributed to the bankrupt insurance company.

 

[AmosMoses]

stephenk,

First, thanks very much for the information. It is sincerely appreciated.

Secondly, yes, I would have lodged this suit anyway. The PI firm is, as far as PI firms go, considerably large...well known, at any rate. My lawyer said that the insurance company had gone into "receivership", but he didn't seem very concerned about that. I just wanted to know if there was any argument that could be made by the PI firm along the lines of "we were insured in good faith at the time of the original lawsuit, the insurance company is insolvent/bankrupt/in receivership/whatever, so any awards or judgements against us ought to be actually really against our insurance company or what remains of it, so therefore we ought to have no responsibility to pay from our assets"...I was just curious about that, and last time I spoke with my lawyer I forgot to ask him how that's handled. I also sued the only actual agent that I could identify after I caught him on my property late one night, chased him with a vehicle, got a license number, etc., as well as "John and/or Jane Doe, nominees for any other agents of this PI firm as identifieded at a later date". They had taken my garbage, etc., from the road, which is legally fine albeit somewhat disconcerting to me, but they removed "garbage" (really junk, but not stuff I had bagged to throw away) from the back of my truck and at my back door...at least 300 to 400 feet onto my property (I lived on 28 acres, and they drove through the gate on to my property). That was actually how I figured out what the hell was going on, by catching these people on my property, with a high speed chase and licence number run at the sheriff's office.

Again, stephenk, thanks.

 

[stephenk]

"I just wanted to know if there was any argument that could be made by the PI firm along the lines of "we were insured in good faith at the time of the original lawsuit, the insurance company is insolvent/bankrupt/in receivership/whatever, so any awards or judgements against us ought to be actually really against our insurance company or what remains of it, so therefore we ought to have no responsibility to pay from our assets".


That would not be a valid defense and the court would not even let them present that argument.

 

[AmosMoses]

Thanks again. Appreciate the info.