Analyzes an Illinois Supreme Court ruling that in some legal malpractice cases, attorneys may have to pay the punitive damages their clients incurred in the underlying case
In determining whether a lawyer must report a potential malpractice claim on a professional liability “errors and omissions” renewal or application form, must the insured attorney foresee how Missouri appellate courts would interpret a legal issue never before addressed? Based on a recent Missouri Court of Appeals opinion, the answer seems to be perhaps yes.
In Ruiz v. Bar Plan Mutual Insurance Co., 2019 WL 4145480 (E.D. Mo. 2019)(Sept. 3, 2019), the Missouri Court of Appeals found that an attorney’s failure to notify his legal malpractice carrier of a potential malpractice ...