LJN Newsletters

Highlights of the latest insurance cases from around the country.

Recent cases have highlighted the continuing disagreement among courts on one of the highest-stakes issues in asbestos coverage litigation: determining the number of occurrences that arise from asbestos exposure.

Automobile insurance carriers in New Jersey and New York are routinely faced with the issue of whether a fraudulent insurance claim for personal injury protection ('PIP') benefits must be adjudicated in statutorily mandated PIP arbitration or whether those claims may be adjudicated in a court of law. In cases involving fraudulently procured insurance policies, this issue was squarely decided on July 27, 2007 by the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court in Nationwide Mutual Fire Insurance Company v. Fiouris.

Litigants and courts are struggling with whether the polution exclusion encompasses "non-traditional" claims that, on their face, would appear to fall within the exclusion's definitions, e.g., lead paint, carbon monoxide poisoning, and other toxic exposure claims. This article first describes the split among the courts on this issue and then looks at the question in the specific sub-context of welding fumes claims.

This article explores the alternatives to patenting.

May a patent owner sue its own licensee's customers when those customers purchase essential components that have no reasonable non-infringing use from the licensee, and then combine those components with others to form a patented product? The answer may be decided by the Supreme Court in Quanta Computer, Inc. v. LG Electronics, Inc., U.S., No. 06-937, cert. granted Sept. 25, 2007.

The second installment of this two-part series examines the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's final rule as it relates to examination of claims, applications with patentably-indistinct claims, second-action final practice, and refund of excess-claim fees.

Part one of this article explained the terminology and discussed some of the challenges employers face in treating transgender employees in a nondiscriminatory manner. Part Two continues the discussion.