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Barrasso Usdin wins at Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal, Enforcing Insurance Policy’s Deductible Requirement
Judy Y. Barrasso and Lon LeSueur secured an appellate victory for an insurance client with the Fifth Circuit, which reversed the district court and held the client was entitled to reimbursement of $1 million pursuant to a policy’s deductible provision. The appeal stems from a summary judgment ruling from the Northern District of Mississippi, which refused to enforce policy language that required the insured to pay the $1 million deductible. In reversing the lower court’s decision, the Fifth Circuit noted that the insured’s position (that was adopted by the lower court) “contravenes two of Texas’s cardinal rules of insurance contract interpretation” and impermissibly rendered the applicable policy language meaningless. The victory provides support for insurers seeking to enforce policy language that requires payment of deductibles from their insureds.
