Strategic Defense Against Bad Faith Claims and Complex Coverage Disputes
From defeating high-exposure bad faith claims to shaping new legal precedent, our team delivers fearless, strategic advocacy that protects insurers’ financial interests and brand integrity across Louisiana, Mississippi, and beyond.
In today’s legal landscape, insurers face an increasingly sophisticated plaintiffs’ bar adept at engineering “bad faith setup” claims designed to create significant financial and reputational risk. At Strauss Massey Dinneen, our proactive, strategic approach to insurance bad faith defense is unmatched across Louisiana, Mississippi, and the Gulf South.
We partner with national and regional insurers at an institutional level to implement best practices that prevent bad faith exposure before it arises. When litigation is unavoidable, our attorneys bring deep trial experience and a proven record of securing early dismissals, summary judgments, and favorable verdicts.
For example, we have won bad faith trials in personal injury and property disputes. We have won dismissal of a $11 million bad faith claim on summary judgment in a large property damage dispute involving a shopping center. We have won dismissal of penalties and attorney’s fees claims based on alleged bad faith for failure to timely tender UM benefits — a decision that was affirmed on appeal and had writs denied by the Louisiana Supreme Court.
In another matter, we obtained dismissal of a substantial UM bad faith claim involving serious injury and $3 million in alleged future wage loss, successfully affirmed by the Louisiana Fourth Circuit.
We also shape the law: we reversed a trial court ruling and established that Louisiana’s anti-steering law protects claimants rather than body shops, creating important precedent. Our attorneys achieved a defense verdict in a major UM and bad faith claim following a five-day jury trial, successfully arguing a failure to cooperate defense.
In another landmark case, we obtained summary judgment, affirmed by the U.S. Fifth Circuit, establishing that post-suit cooperation does not cure pre-suit breaches of policy terms — fundamentally reshaping bad faith exposure law. And we were consulted in recent legislative sessions regarding changes to the bad faith statutes.
Types of Bad Faith & Coverage Matters We Handle
- Allegations of failure to settle or timely pay claims
- Claims of failure to defend or indemnify under liability policies
- Claims of improper coverage denials in commercial general liability/business policies
- Uninsured/underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) bad faith disputes
- Breach of cooperation and fraud-related defenses
- Claims involving alleged unfair trade practices or anti-steering violations
- Disputes over reservation of rights and policy interpretation
- First-party property and catastrophe coverage disputes
- Declaratory judgment actions to clarify coverage obligations
- Extra-contractual exposure mitigation and institutional risk assessments
- Appeals and precedent-setting bad faith litigation strategy
These results illustrate our clear, candid, and business-focused approach. We know that for insurers, protecting market reputation and ensuring policyholder confidence are as critical as winning any individual case. Our goal is always to minimize exposure, safeguard brand integrity, and achieve efficient, strategic resolutions — reinforcing Strauss Massey Dinneen as the go-to choice for insurance bad faith and coverage defense.
