Travelers Indemnity Co. v. Rogers Cartage Co.

2017 IL App (1st) 160780 (Ill. App., 2017)

Words & Phrases

Policy: Existence Of

Trial Judge

Peter Flynn

Appellate Judge

Pierce

Holding

In a missing policy case, the insured successfully proved the existence and terms of disputed CGL and auto policies from the 1960s providing coverage for environmental contamination.

Fact Summary

Rogers Cartage Company is a trucking company that hauls bulk liquid chemicals from a shipper to an end-user. Two of Rogers’s former truck cleaning facilities in Cahokia and Sauget, located in St. Clair County, were the subject of environmental contamination lawsuits. Rogers tendered defense of the underlying claims to The Travelers Indemnity Company and Travelers Property Casualty Company of America (collectively, Travelers), seeking coverage under numerous insurance policies issued by Travelers to Rogers. Travelers ultimately paid all of Rogers’s defense costs under a reservation of rights, and Rogers eventually settled the two underlying suits for a total of $9 million. Rogers then sought indemnification from Travelers under numerous comprehensive general liability (CGL) and auto policies, including the missing CGL and auto policies that are the focus of these proceedings.

Travelers filed this declaratory judgment action in Cook County circuit court seeking a declaration of the parties’ rights regarding the existence, terms, and conditions of  various missing insurance policies allegedly issued by Travelers to Rogers in the 1960s and 1970s.1 It is undisputed that neither party can locate originals or copies of the disputed policies, and that there are no witnesses with contemporaneous knowledge of the existence, terms, or conditions of the disputed policies.

 

SEE ALSO RELATED CASE: ROGERS CARTAGE V TRAVELERS, 2018 IL APP (5TH) 106098 RE BAD FAITH FAILURE TO SETTLE

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