Jury Finds for Most Insurers In World Trade Center Case

[R. A. Hettinga]

...which means, that now Uncle Fed et. al. is on the hook, financially, to
build the proposed bedrock-to-blue-sky mausoleum at WTC.

Which stands to reason, given the fact that the property was expropriated
by the state anyway, some 40+ years ago.

World "Trade", indeed...


Cheers,
RAH
-------

<http://online.wsj.com/article_print/0,,SB108326757696697579,00.html>

The Wall Street Journal

      April 29, 2004 5:14 p.m. EDT
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Jury Finds for Most Insurers
 In World Trade Center Case

Associated Press
April 29, 2004 5:14 p.m.


NEW YORK -- World Trade Center leaseholder Larry Silverstein suffered a
court defeat Thursday that means he won't get his $3.5 billion insurance
policy paid twice over.

In a partial verdict, a federal jury found that the majority of the
insurers, who hold more than a billion dollars of the policy, are bound by
a form that defined the Sept. 11 terrorism attack as one event.

The trial was the first of at least two that will ultimately decide how
much insurance money will be available to rebuild ground zero.

The verdict came just after the jury said in a note that it had reached a
decision days ago on all except the largest insurance company, Swiss Re
International Business Insurance Co.

Judge Michael Mukasey decided to accept the findings and to send the jury
back to resume deliberating the Swiss Re issue.

The jury did find in Silverstein's favor regarding three insurance
companies, but they provided less than $200 million of the insurance for
the trade center.

If Mr. Silverstein prevails against Swiss Re and companies not subject to
this trial, he could eventually receive a double payment for roughly $2
billion in insurance.

The partial verdict came after a 21/2-month trial that focused on which
insurance policies applied at the trade center when the towers collapsed on
Sept. 11, 2001.

Mr. Silverstein has waged a court battle since shortly after Sept. 11 to
have the destruction of the trade center declared two separate events for
insurance purposes, which would entitle him to two payouts of the $3.5
billion policy he was still negotiating when the towers fell.

Although the 13 insurers' policy hadn't been finalized on Sept. 11, the
insurers said they had signed temporary binders based on the terms of a
form issued by Mr. Silverstein's broker, Willis Group Holdings Ltd.

An appeals court ruled last September that that form, known as Wilprop,
would define the Sept. 11 destruction of the trade center as one occurrence
for insurance purposes, meaning Mr. Silverstein would only be entitled to
one payout.

The 13 insurers held about $2.1 billion in coverage on the trade center.

A second trial will attempt to define the trade center's collapse as one
attack or two. A third trial would determine how much the insurers must pay.

In closing arguments last week, Mr. Silverstein's attorney Herbert Wachtell
argued that the Willis brokers had switched the 13 insurers over to another
policy form issued by Travelers Property Casualty Corp. in July 2001.

Mr. Wachtell said that Willis broker Timothy Boyd, who obtained insurance
for Mr. Silverstein, either told representatives for the insurers they were
switching to Travelers, or weren't obligated to because some insurers
waived the ultimate wording of the policy's form.

But insurers' attorneys, led by Barry Ostrager of Swiss Reinsurance Ltd.,
which carried a leading 22% share of the policy, said that the Willis
brokers could produce no emails or written notice to the insurers that a
switch was being made.

The insurers also referred to a Sept. 12, 2001, fax by Silverstein
insurance manager Robert Strachan of the Wilprop form to site owner Port
Authority of New York and New Jersey and a leading Silverstein lender as
evidence that that was the insurance that applied at the time. Silverstein
attorneys argued that Mr. Strachan was distraught the day after the attacks
and mistakenly didn't receive an email attachment of the Travelers form, so
just faxed what he had in his office.

One Willis broker, Paul Blackmore, did testify he had emailed the Travelers
form to Swiss Re underwriter Daniel Bollier, who testified that he received
it, but didn't read it carefully because such a form had never been
discussed with him.

In his instructions to the jury, Judge Mukasey said that jurors could
decide that one party in the case is bound by a form it didn't read, but
only if the party had been given fair notice of the existence of that form.


-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'