The Insurance Journal reports a rise in legal malpractice claims. Incredibly, there has been no hand wringing about increased malpractice rates for lawyers or fears that lawyers can no longer keep their practices open as their insurance rates rise. We have never had a legal malpractice claim yet our rates…
Allstate has agreed to pay New York $1.2 million as part of a $10 million regulatory settlement involving Colossus, its infamous computer software that values personal injury auto accident claims. Under attack was Allstate’s use of Colossus, a software program Allstate and many other insurance companies use to determine the…
Yesterday, the Maryland Daily Record published the first of a three-part series I wrote with retired Judge Clifton J. Gordy (now a mediator and arbitrator) on mediation in serious personal injury and wrongful death claims. The article is for both plaintiff and defense lawyers looking to make mediations as productive…
I disagree with many of the philosophical views presented at Point of Law and Overlawyered. Then why do I read both blogs every day? Because they are informative, well-presented posts that make me occasionally question my own views. I hope to have you as a reader of the Maryland Injury…
The Maryland Court of Special Appeals in a 2-1 decision today affirmed a Frederick County trial court’s grant of summary judgment to Erie Insurance in an underinsured motorist lawsuit. The nutshell: State Farm paid its $100,000 liability policy in a serious injury car accident case. Plaintiff sought payment under his…
Maryland Senate Bill 468 passed today in the Maryland Senate. It increases – from $10,000 to $20,000 – the maximum amount in controversy in a civil action in which a party may not demand a jury trial. Defendants would only be able to “bump up” cases between $20,000 and $30,000…
I received this email from a personal injury lawyer in Maryland this morning: I have an MIA complaint involving Allstate offered the number provided by Colossus and now, of course, refuses to produce any Colossus manuals, etc. Do you have some useful Colossus materials? I don’t. Maryland’s bad faith law…
The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals decided whether a debtor’s claims for legal relief that arose after the confirmation but before the completion of his plan to pay creditors are property of the estate, under Chapter 13 of the Bankruptcy Code. Here, after the debtors’ joint Chapter 13 plan was…
The Maryland Court of Special Appeals had occasion this month to consider what makes up a resident relative for uninsured motorist coverage in Mundey v. Erie Insurance Group. Here, The Maryland intermediate appellate court found a Prince George’s County man who had been living with his grandmother in Waldorf, Maryland…
The Court of Special Appeals of Maryland ruled last week in Shafer v. Interstate Automobile Ins. Co. that a motorcycle passenger – who was injured when the motorcycle on which she was riding blew out a tire – is not entitled to uninsured motorist coverage because she failed to meet…