Posted on 10/29/2011 7:03:01 PM PDT by CedarDave
A Bernalillo County jury’s $12 million judgment this week against Progressive Insurance Co. was “very reasonable,” according to attorneys representing the family who sued.
Lawyer Janet Santillanes said that among the evidence jurors heard during the six-day trial was that Progressive altered its computer records 11 days after a Nov. 4, 2002, accident to make it appear the Vigil family did not have coverage at the time of the single-vehicle crash that was at the center of the case.
The company contended the policy lapsed about 90 minutes before the crash that killed one man and hospitalized five other passengers. Jurors also heard that Colleen Vigil called Progressive twice — two weeks before the crash and the day before — and was assured her policy was valid, with no payment due until Nov. 15, Santillanes said in a telephone interview with the Journal on Thursday.
She said Progressive’s policy is to record all conversations with policyholders, but the recordings of Colleen Vigil’s calls either were lost or never made.
A Bernalillo County District Court jury granted the Vigil family $11.7 million in punitive damages designed to punish Progressive for bad faith, and a few hundred thousand more in compensatory damages and for pain and suffering.
“The jury also heard evidence that Progressive’s profits are $3.8 million a day and (the company) had 11,700,000 policies in effect in 2010,” Santillanes said. “So the amount of damages to a multi-billion dollar corporation for a case that took nine years was very reasonable.”
(Excerpt) Read more at abqjournal.com ...
How could they be “cheap”
They seem to spend more on adverts than anybody....
I hope the fine print on my various insurance policies does not give the insurance company a way to avoid paying. Food for thought.
I would never have bought their insurance anyway - their commercials creep me out,
Progressive admitted they record all calls, but ‘lost’ the recording of the plaintiff’s calls.
Technically you are correct, but if the Presiding Judge found MERIT in The EVIDENCE ( allowed), as did the JURY presumably, the Judge should have IMMEDIATELY ORDERED A CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION at the Moment the Evidence was introduced. The Judge should be removed from the Bench. THEY BELONG IN PRISON.
I did. I prepaid cash for 6 months. And then got a notice from the underwriter's computer geeks that had me living in a place I haven't lived in 12 years, jacking up the premium by $56.
So on the pumpkin day, I called for the 3rd time to make sure they had gotten the certified proof that not only do I live where I live but have for years.
It's called follow-up.
Caveat Emptor.
/johnny
From my own experience with this company - GOOD!
some insurance companies are more decent than others.
The day the Clutter family was murdered in Kansas, Herb Clutter had taken out a large life insurance policy on himself.
The entire family was murdered that night. Clutter’s check had not been deposited and for what ever legal reason, the insurance company had no legal responsibility to pay the claim.
The company, New York Life, went ahead and paid anyway, maybe partly for good publicity and maybe partly because they thought it was the right thing to do.
So Roosevelt and the Bullmoose Party were communists?
It doesn’t matter if the check had been deposited.
It only only had to be given to the agent or broker, or put in the mail.
It was in New Mexico.
It's really a shame when folks try to trivialize that case.
No, just incredibly misguided. TR was a big gov statist.
I know members of the family. I should amend that to *knew*. We no longer speak.
They are not just Dem supporters. They are die hard anti-American far left radical Marxists.
They may be aware of how bad things are, though. One of the nephews is moving half his antique car collection to a safe location out of his present notoriously unsafe urban area of residence.
What kind of idiot puts a styrofoam cup of hot coffee between their legs in a car?
I am not sure what the technical reason was but the book, “In Cold Blood” made it clear that the insurance company had no legal obligation to pay the claim.
Like you, I would have thought as soon as the agent accepted the check, they would have been covered.
Agreed. Progressive is one of the most scummy companies on the planet. I had a accident that was clearly their customers fault with gross negligence by said customer that was reinforced by a police report. Progressive tried to pin the fault on me and make my insurer pay. I spent several fuming days on the phone with adjusters from both companies fighting that one. They are the epitome of sleaze.
I don’t know. Maybe an idiot in a car without cup-holders.
Where the 3rd degree burns occur is not the issue. It’s that they happen at all.
Yet these same insurance companies go after those that commit fraud against them. Most go to jail.
Will ANYBODY from this pathetic excuse of an insurance company go to jail? Doubtful.
They should have been awarded triple the amount they were awarded. BANKRUPT THE BASTARDS I SAY!
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