Fraud is fraud, and you take your chances of losing a great deal when you engage in it, even when you are a white collar insurance exec. My guess is that the jury got really sick of listening to stories about the lies and the document shredding, and dropped the hammer.
Gee, they paid the full amount ($136K) after the trial, though they were not obligated to do so that I can see from the facts presented here. And I don't understand the nature of the "fraud"--what I see is an outraged "disabler's" lawyer who managed to generate some anti-corporate sentiment.
Just how much is "worry" worth? Clearly, a lot more than a disabling injury. This is another caprice of the tort bar.
And everyone who pays State Farm premiums, along with every other insurance company, will be paying *more* for this nonsense. Is it State Farm that's abandoning a huge homeowner's market in Texas? Perhaps that's Allstate...1.2 million without home insurance. That's a lot fewer deep pockets.
In the long term, this is a hurt to the injured...