The next time you hear that an insurance company pays millions of dollars and frivolous claims, remember this case. State Farm refused to pay $50,000 to settle both a wrongful death case and a permanent disability case when its own investigators determined its insured [driver Curtis Campbell] to be at fault.
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Tort reformers tell us that insurance companies routinely pay millions of dollars on frivolous claims. That contention is hard to square with the actions of insurers like State Farm.
State Farm was willing to lie, cheat, defraud, harm its customer, create false documents, destroy evidence, intimidate the weak and slander the dead in order to avoid paying a total of $50,000 on a wrongful death claim and a permanent disability claim when State Farm knew that liability was clear.
Does that sound like a company that would pay millions of dollars on a frivolous claim?
State Farm ordered its attorneys to use "mad dog litigation tactics" including "using the company's large resources to "wear out" opposing attorneys by prolonging litigation, making meritless objections, claiming false privileges, destroying documents, and abusing the law and motion process." Tort reformers would have more credibility if they proposed any reform to address those sort of abuses.
If you believe that insurance companies pay out millions of dollars for frivolous cases and that litigation abuse occurs only on the plaintiff’s side, we expect that you would also believe that State Farm acts "like a good neighbor."
The full post is revealing in its detail — State Farm's tactical use of a concocted "pregnant girlfriend" and its Enron-style document destruction, to name just two examples. It's yet another PLA gem you should read.
