Can a jury award damages if an insurance policy says otherwise? The question was recently put before Judges Brian Rickman, Stephen Dillard and Trea Pipkin of the Georgia Court of Appeals in a disputed jury verdict favoring an unsatisfied State Farm home insurance policyholder.
Defendant-appellants, represented by Alex Mikhalevsky and Mark Dietrichs from NLJ 500 firm Swift Currie, took issue with the trial court jury award on five counts that boiled down to the plaintiff’s failure to meet their burden of proof when trying to collect an insurance claim to recover costs to fix their house after a snowstorm. While the plaintiffs had received some relief for the damages in 2017, they contended that it wasn’t nearly enough to actually conduct the needed repairs and took the issue to court. The jury agreed.
