Deutsch Kerrigan has decades of experience defending insurers and their insureds from commercial and personal property claims arising from hurricanes and other natural disasters. Our attorneys have represented architects, engineers, contractors, insurance agents and brokers in a wide range of first and third-party matters including those related to coverage disputes, insurance defense litigation, first-party bad faith litigation, and professional liability. Our team approach to post-hurricane litigation provides expedient and cost-effective representation to our clients. For mass-action issues resulting from large-scale catastrophic events such as Hurricane Katrina, Deutsch Kerrigan works towards developing creative solutions to case resolution to minimize costs to our clients.
For one major property insurer after Hurricane Katrina, Deutsch Kerrigan handled over 100 cases dealing with insurance coverage issues, business interruption and bad faith that resulted from Hurricane Katrina and successfully resolved every case without a single judgment rendered against the insurer.
Experience
A few examples of Hurricanes and other natural disaster work we have assisted clients with include:
- Design Defect Suit
After 2016 Flooding in Baton Rouge, LA Deutsch Kerrigan attorneys defended an engineering firm in a class action lawsuit brought on by residents, businesses and municipalities claiming damages after a catastrophic flood in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 2016. The plaintiffs alleged that the design of an Interstate median barrier impeded the flow of water and caused the flooding to their properties. Although the lawsuit is still pending, Deutsch Kerrigan was able to get our engineering client voluntarily dismissed by the plaintiffs.
- $18M Insurance broker litigation claim - Hurricane Property Damage and Business Income Loss
The plaintiff in this case, a cold storage warehouse operator with three locations in Louisiana, sustained severe property damage and business income losses resulting from Hurricane Katrina. The plaintiff sued its insurance carrier and broker and claimed that its damages exceeded $18 million. Deutsch Kerrigan represented the plaintiff's insurance broker in the litigation, who the plaintiff alleged failed to procure the proper coverage. Through tailored written discovery requests and depositions of representatives of the insurance company, our firm established that the broker placed the proper coverage and obtained the dismissal of their client. Not only did their efforts benefit the broker, they also helped the insured, who was the broker's client.
- Insurance Coverage
Deutsch Kerrigan handled this case where a medical clinic filed suit against its insurer and broker for alleged business interruption losses in the amount of $900,000, which it sustained as a result of Hurricane Katrina. The firm represented the broker and successfully obtained a dismissal via summary judgment on the grounds that the medical clinic's claims were perempted under La. R.S. 9:5606.
- Hurricane Katrina Levee Breach – Appeal
On April 30, 2009, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of all claims against a defendant contractor Boh Bros Construction Co., and several engineering defendants including Modjeski and Masters, Inc. and Deutsch Kerrigan client Burk-Kleinpeter, Inc., in the Hurricane Katrina levee breach consolidated litigation in federal court in New Orleans. Over 300,000 claims, asserting $400 billion in damages, were filed against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Orleans Levee District, and several contractors and engineering firms which were engaged in various projects in the outfall drainage canals in New Orleans before the August 2005 hurricane. The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's decision that the Louisiana peremption statutes pertaining to engineers and contractors applied as a bar to the claims and that admiralty jurisdiction and federal maritime law did not apply.
- Hurricane Katrina Levee Breach
A joint motion for summary judgment filed by Deutsch Kerrigan on behalf of Burk Kleinpeter, Inc. and another engineering firm plaintiffs involved in work supervised by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the mammoth consolidated Hurricane Katrina levee breach litigation pending before Judge Stanwood Duval in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana was GRANTED and certified under Rule 54(b). The judgment upholds and enforces the five-year preemptive period of La RS 9: 5607, dismissing the claims filed in fourteen class action suits against the clients of the firm.