Firm obtains summary judgment for insurance company in coverage dispute
BOSTON (Oct. 14, 2010) – Scarlett M. Rajbanshi recently obtained summary judgment on behalf of an insurance company by successfully arguing that a crime insurance policy excluded coverage for the loss of an organization’s registration fees.
A Massachusetts Superior Court judge ruled that the policy unambiguously barred the organization from tapping into the policy related to the failure of an online payment service to turn over fees it had collected on behalf of the organization.
A youth baseball league had hired the online payment company to allow league participants to pay registration fees by credit card. Unfortunately, the company failed to turn over most of the registration money it had collected, essentially stealing the money.
The crime insurance policy provided coverage for “losses caused by the actual destruction, disappearance or wrongful abstraction of Money … outside” the business premises of the insured “while being conveyed by the insured, a partner, an employee … or any other person duly authorized by the insured to have custody [of the money].”
However, the policy specifically excluded coverage for losses “due to [t]heft or any other fraudulent, dishonest or criminal act … by any … authorized representative of the Insured.” The conduct of the online payment company fell squarely within that exclusion.
The trial court judge also ruled that the carrier did not make any misrepresentations to the organization regarding the policy exclusion.
About Taylor Duane
Taylor Duane is one of New England’s leading civil litigation law firms with offices in Boston and Providence. Its experienced trial attorneys appear regularly in the federal and state courts of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. The Providence Business News has named the firm as one of Rhode Island’s Best Places to Work for three consecutive years (2008-2010).
