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STORM WATER SEMINARS
Leading experts in California municipal, industrial, commercial and construction storm water regulations will be giving all day seminars on the following dates and locations: September 12, 2008 Santa Monica, California January 15, 2009 Pasadena, California

Supreme Court accepts Ameron case for review
We represent the policyholder in Ameron International Corp. v. ISOP, 150 Cal. App. 4th 1050 (2007), in which the Court of Appeal upheld insurance coverage for claims brought against Ameron by the U.S. government in the U.S. Department of Interior Board of Contract Appeals. In a lengthy opinion, the Court ruled that coverage was not limited to lawsuits filed in a court, under policies issued after 1985. This is the first reported case on that subject in California. The California Supreme Court has previously ruled that coverage is limited to lawsuits filed in a court, under policies issued before 1985. Ameron seeks to overturn those rulings. The Court of Appeal, in an unusual ruling, believed that Ameron should have coverage under pre-1985 policies, but felt bound to follow Supreme Court precedent. The Supreme COurt has now accepted the case for review and Ameron seeks to change or overturn Supreme Court precedent in California.

$2,500,000 punitive damages
We represented Professional Building Contractors after it had been sued by Essex Insurance Company, in a dispute over a construction defect claim. The jury in Los Angeles Superior Court entered a verdict on October 15, 2007, awarding $2,500,000 in punitive damages against Essex, plus $682,000 in compensatory damages, which included $320,000 in our attorneys' fees.

Expert Testimony
Jordan Stanzler recently testified as an expert on attorneys' fees and bad faith before a jury in Orange County. Griffin Dewatering Co. sued Northern Insurance Company for failing to defend a lawsuit brought as a result of a contruction project in which sewage backed up into a private residence. The insurance company denied coverage on the basis of the total pollution exclusion, which the Superior Court ruled did not apply in these circumstances. Mr. Stanzler testified as an expert on the reasonableness of attorneys' fees and the conduct of the insurance company. The jurya awarded approximately $ 1 million in attorneys' fees and $11 million in punitve damages. December, 2005.

Coverage for Unfair Business Practices Defended
Many businesses in California find themselves being sued for Unfair Business Practices, under section 17200 of the Business and Professiona Code. Insurance companies typically argue that they have no duty to defend any such lawsuits. Chubb said so in the case of American Specialty Health, a managed care organization that provides services for chirporactors and their patients. Chubb refused to defend a lawsuit brought by an association of chiropractors, who complained about the billing and reimbursement procedures of American Specialty Health. Chubb reversed itself completely after we filed a lawsuit in federal court; they settled immediately in the case of American Specialty Health v. Chubb Corp.

Claims Made Coverage Protected
Insurance companies often try to limit the scope of coverage under claims made policies issued to professionals by claiming that separate claims should be combined into one single interrelated "super claim". In a case that garnered nationwide publicity after an FBI raid, over 700 plaintiffs sued various doctors at Tenet Healthcare in Redding, California, alleging that they performed unnecessary heart surgery as part of an overall scheme that included inflated Medicare bills. The insurance company for the doctors brought a lawsuit seeking to declare that all of the claims should be treated as a single "super claim", thus limiting the amount of coverage available to the doctors. We defeated that attempt to narrow coverage in the case of The Doctors Company v. Realyvasquez, Shasta County Superior Court.

Recently defended two companies
We recently defended two companies who were alleged to have contaminated the groundwater and injured thousands of residents in the San Gabriel Valley area. This massive toxic tort case has been going on for years. We were able to settle all claims against two industrial companies in the area, by obtaining very favorable settlements. The amounts are confidential.

Major victory for Client
We recently won a major victory for James Jones Company on the insurance company's duty to defend its policyholder under a general liability policy. The James Jones Company has been in the business of making parts, such as valves, for municipal water systems. A former employee filed a lawsuit under the False Claims Act alleging that the parts which Jones sold to hundreds of municipalities were sub-standard and leached excessive amounts of water into the municipal water supply. Numerous cities and water districts joined in the lawsuit. Jones' insurance company refused to pay for the cost of defending the lawsuit, citing a number of exclusions in the policy. We successfully argued that the insurance company breached its duty to defend, in what appears to be a case of first impression involving allegations of false claims. Watts Industries, Inc. and James Jones Co. v. Zurich American Insurance Company, 121 Cal. App. 4th 1029 (2004)