Lexington Insurance Company Expands Spoliation Insurance Product

Lexington Insurance Company, a Chartis company, on Tuesday announced that it would make its Spoliation Insurance endorsement available to a broad array of insureds, including lawyers, accountants, testing facilities, and document and property storage facilities. Coverage is designed to protect against third party claims alleging spoliation of evidence that is material to a legal proceeding.

Published on August 31, 2011

Lexington first provided coverage for spoliation claims as an endorsement to its professional liability policies for architects and engineers. Upon the announcement of the new coverage, the enthusiastic response from the marketplace suggested there was a need for the coverage across multiple professional and property product lines.

Many states recognize a separate spoliation tort action for the destruction, alteration or loss of evidence. For professional liability insureds, Spoliation Insurance broadens coverage to recognize spoliation as a wrongful act under the policy, providing coverage for the liability that professionals handling evidence face, even when negligence is not alleged. For property insureds, Spoliation Insurance changes the way the valuation of lost or damaged property used as evidence is determined. Under Spoliation Insurance, a loss is valued as the adjudicated damages determined in court – a significant improvement on standard property coverage, which values such property at replacement cost or actual cash value.

“A bolt in a construction project is worth very little in actual cash value,” said Sanjay Godhwani, Executive Vice President and Property Division Executive of Lexington Insurance Company. “But if it fails and leads to loss of life, it might become evidence in a trial, where it could be worth an exponentially greater amount.”

For more information regarding Spoliation Insurance for property exposures, please contact Edward Fox at (617) 235-8970. For more information regarding Spoliation Insurance for professional liability exposures, please contact Jill Salmon at (646) 857-1425 or Vanessa Maxwell at (646) 857-1341. You can also visit www.lexingtoninsurance.com, as well as www.lexcasts.com for the Spoliation Torts podcast and additional information on Spoliation Insurance.