Insurance company found liable in case involving injured police officers (Bucks County Courier Times)March 15, 2011
George Mattar
Bucks County Courier Times
A Philadelphia jury has found the insurance company liable for fraud in a case and awarded $500,000 to two seriously injured Bristol Township police officers, who were hit by a drunken driver in 2005.
On Aug. 27, 2005, officers Michael Egan and Mark Buzby, were investigating an accident on Route 13 in Croydon, when they were hit by a drunken and uninsured driver, who was speeding, records show.
The two officers have already received $8 million in recoveries and benefits, records show.
The two officers were crushed against their own patrol car. Egan had one leg amputated and Buzby suffered permanent injuries to his legs, records show.
On Tuesday, a Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas found the insurance company, USI Midatlantic, liable for fraud in seeking to deprive insurance benefits owed to Buzby and Egan.
A week ago, a jury rendered a verdit against USI, a member of Goldman Sachs Capital Partners, according to a press release from the lawyers for the police officers.
The jury found the company liable after eight days of testimony. The press release said the jury found USI liable to the injured police officers for fraud, breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing and intentional interference with contract.
The trial lasted nearly three weeks and the jury found USI and two of its employees, claims manager Robert Brown and assistant vice president Freda Batipps, engaged in fraudulent conduct and intentional interference with contract. The jury also found these defendants, together with USI claims analyst Linda Magovern, liable for the "breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing" owed by an insurance broker to an insured party.
In their lawsuit, the officers alleged that before the accident, the USI defendants failed to obtain a written statutory waiver of uninsured motorist coverage as required by the Pennsylvania Motor Vehicle Financial Responsibility Law.
The legal effect of this failure, the plaintiffs asserted, was to create an entitlement to benefits.
The plaintiffs contended the USI defendants, realizing their mistake, embarked on a year-long fraudulent scheme to get backdated waiver forms from Bristol Township and to use the backdated forms as a basis to deny insurance coverage to the officers.
Despite the $8 million the two officers got, the jury found the USI employees committed fraud by producing a backdated waiver form, claiming that the form was valid and enforceable and served to reject uninsured motorist coverage under state law.
Tuesday's $500,000 award, to be split by the two officers, is for "emotional distress and other damages" caused by USI's misconduct, the press release said.
Egan said he and Buzby feel some sort of closure from this ordeal that is going on six years.
"We have been fighting this in court and were told basically that we were making up our claims. The jury listened to the facts and had nothing to win or lose in this case, but found in our favor. I was on the stand testifying and told the truth. Yes, the compensatory damages are helpful, but what is more important is that we got out there that this company absolutely defrauded us and we wanted to make that what happened to us, never happens to anyone ever again," said Egan.
Buzby was represented by Gerald A. McHugh, Jr. and Daniel Bencivenga of Raynes McCarty, also in Philadelphia.
