Posted on 05/08/2016 11:13:03 AM PDT by Cyberman
In 2010, the police department in Rutledge, Tenn., was riven by scandal. The police chief, a 12-year department veteran, had been charged with assault and was under investigation by state authorities. But that wasn't what Mayor Danny Turley cited when he fired the top cop that year. Turley "had no choice," he said--his "hands were tied"--because the city could have lost its liability insurance if the chief kept his job. That would have left Rutledge responsible for paying out on future lawsuits, potentially crippling its small budget. So the insurance company got its way, and a police officer got an early retirement.
My research on municipal liability insurance turned up this and other examples of police chiefs--including some reform-minded administrators--who owe their jobs to pushy insurance adjusters. The insurance companies... offer policies that reimburse cities held liable for harm their law enforcement officers inflict. The coverage is broad: It often includes intentional acts such as discrimination or assault and battery, as well as punitive damages, which are meant to punish egregious misbehavior. There is no national data about the size of this insurance market, but it's big. Lawsuits stemming from recent shootings by officers, such as those of Laquan McDonald in Illinois and Walter Scott in South Carolina, have settled in the ballpark of $6 million per case.
The arrangement creates a potential moral-hazard problem--a risk that insured municipalities will be less vigilant against police misconduct than they'd be in the absence of insurance. But it also empowers insurers, which are committed to strategies of "loss prevention." In an age when police departments, backed by politicians and powerful unions, are said to resist complaints about brutality and abuse, some insurance companies are playing an unheralded role: as private regulators of police activity....
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Recall that Governor Palin was swamped with lawsuits and had to quit her job? It’s called lawfare. It is a principle weapon of liberals. We need to put a stop to it.
No, it’s the workings of the Invisible Hand. Read some Adam Smith and get back to us.
Easy. Let the litigant pay all legal costs when a frivolous charge is dismissed.
By making the lives of those who use it into a living hell!
Does anybody remember the reporter that was dispatched to Alaska for a YEAR for the purpose of digging up dirt on Palin?
Neither do I.
But that SOB shouldn't EVER even be able to walk into a Starbuck's outside his liberal enclave without somebody "accidentally" spilling a venti all over his laptop.
Insurance companies NEVER stay in business that isn’t profitable unless they can change the rules to their advantage. What happens when the insurance companies back out of the cities with never-ending payouts?
Oftentimes, the reward award is beaten back by a judge on appeal.
How can places such as Baltimore, Ferguson, or Chicago do that? They'll be reduced to something straight out of Sci-fi depictions of cities in the future.
My case ...
Home owners insurance at the time I build solar p.v. arrays to power my house. Coverage was included in the base premium. Wind ahead three years, total exclusion at renewal. Owner at total risk unless he coughs up another 15% in premium.
same thing in American industry.
Bogus suits against the company go to trial and the company’s insurance demand it be settled and not go to trial, no matter how much evidence the company has to disprove the charge. I have some stories from my time in industry you wouldn’t believe.
Saw that with a local water company. They never had a say. The insurance settled a claim when the perpetrator who was drunk was the cause of death.
I’m pretty sure big cities like Bmore and Chitown are already self-insured. Can you imagine trying to assess risk for a city of millions?
Not just the tactic but the libtards as well..
I think the journalist who went up to Alaska to harass Sarah Palin and her family later died.
The same with the townhouse community George Zimmerman lived in.
So is the increased insurance cost related to the potential costs of replacing the improvements to your home, by the addition of the solar system, or increased risk of fire or ??
More costs imposed by LBJ’s Great Society, which destroyed the black families, leading to more policing costs and more policing incidents.
The “Great Society” was/is a complete disaster.
In Lethal Weapon 4 (1998) both Riggs and Murtaugh are promoted to captain (bypassing lieutenant because there aren’t any openings) to get them off the streets because the department may be dropped by its insurance carrier.
When I built the array in 2013, I increased the overall coverage to reflect the increase in the cost to replace the home (approx +25k). By 2016, they excluded solar coverage but they did not lower the home cost by the 25k. They wanted a separate $300 a year for solar gear. Premium did not change from pre/post solar exclusion.
All I would like to see if the state decree that roof mounted solar gear is part of the structure and cannot be singled out for exclusion. An insurer must either insure it all or not write at all.
Its like each year the insurers have a department that looks for items to exclude for the next year. They did it with fungi, mold, etc.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.