Source: https://www.carltonfields.com/team/d/robert-w-diubaldo?refindustry=750c8077-2535-4c09-9ce7-125f4826421e
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 20:10:40+00:00

Document:
Rob DiUbaldo is a litigator, advisor, and counselor to companies engaged in the insurance, reinsurance, consumer finance and mortgage, and financial services sectors.
He is co-chair of the firm’s property and casualty insurance group, leads the group’s primary and excess casualty insurance practice, and is co-leader of the firm’s reinsurance division. He regularly counsels and represents domestic and international insurers and reinsurers on matters involving complex claims, coverage, regulatory, and commercial issues, and has litigated and arbitrated a wide variety of disputes in the P&C, life, and health space. He also has been involved in disputes involving third-party administrators, brokers, managing general agents and underwriters and insolvency proceedings, and advises (re)insurers on contract wording and treaty and policy drafting, both first-party and third-party coverages.
Rob is also an active member of the firm’s consumer finance and title insurance practices, representing lenders, mortgage servicers, financial institutions, title insurers, and other entities in dispute resolution and counseling involving a wide array of issues.
Represented cedents, reinsurers, run-off vehicles, asset managers, and other entities in the (re)insurance sector in dispute resolution, coverage matters, and other matters that require counsel and advice. He has litigated and arbitrated disputes involving a broad range of issues in the P&C and life and health sectors, as well as many specialty lines, such as financial and surety products.
He has substantial experience in matters concerning allocation, aggregation, notice or sunset provisions, follow the fortunes and settlements, follow the form, underwriting and pricing, claims handling, utmost good faith, rescission, insolvency, subrogation, inuring coverage, regulatory issues, and a variety of different types of contract wording disputes arising under facultative certificates and reinsurance treaties.
Specific to the life reinsurance industry, Rob represents cedents and reinsurers in matters involving issues such as premium rate increases under YRT and other types of reinsurance treaties, recapture, actuarial and pricing issues, agent and broker misconduct and administrative errors, as well as other situations involving reinsured products and customary or bespoke provisions in life reinsurance agreements.
He also counsels clients on the drafting of reinsurance contracts and commutation agreements, issues pertaining to (re)insurer insolvencies, and has assisted on transactions in the (re)insurance sector.
Acts as coverage counsel for, and litigates and arbitrates on behalf of, insurers in matters involving many different lines of business, including commercial general liability, D&O, E&O, professional liability, EPL, cyber, property, business interruption, life and health, lender-placed insurance products, workers’ compensation, pollution, marine, and energy. He has substantial experience, at both the primary and excess layer, with a host of traditional insurance coverage issues, including trigger, exhaustion, allocation, number of occurrences and aggregation, other insurance provisions, scope of coverage, additional insured rights, recoupment, consent to settle or voluntary payment provisions, follow form clauses, and claims-made and notice requirements, as well as with both standard and unique exclusions or endorsements utilized in the industry.
In the CGL context, he has represented and counseled insurers on many different types of claims, including clergy sexual abuse, construction defect, lead paint exposure, diacetyl exposure, other types of alleged bodily injury, asbestos-toxic tort, third-party property damage, antitrust and statutory violations, environmental damage, product contamination, food borne illness, and pollution. His experience includes representing insurers in matters involving excess policy limit verdicts and settlements or in which bad faith is alleged.
He also assists insurers in the drafting of insurance policy wordings, both in the first- and third-party contexts, and has advised clients in this capacity on wording-related issues arising under property, CGL, E&O, financial lines, and other specialty coverages.
Quiet title claims, disputes involving lien priority or defects, alleged violations of and compliance with TILA, RESPA, HOEPA, and other consumer protection statutes, real property disputes, erroneous satisfaction and lien release matters, loan modification disputes, and disputes involving fraud, contract-based or negligence claims.
Provided coverage advice to title insurers and litigated title insurance coverage disputes, on matters involving consent to settle provisions, late notice and reporting provisions, bad faith and anti-assignment provisions in the context of access-easement issues, the scope of a carrier’s duty to defend for covered and uncovered causes of action, and the applicability of certain exclusions, such as the “assumed or agreed to” exclusion.
Reinsurance-related issues pertaining to the duty of utmost good faith, follow the fortunes, the duty to disclose, the alleged breach of certain underwriting guidelines, and agent misconduct.
Certain reported decisions are listed below.
Represented (re)insurers in various arbitrations and pre-dispute matters involving a reinsurers’ or retrocessionaires’ ability to increase premium rates under YRT reinsurance treaties.
Represented a life reinsurer in an arbitration involving the scope of a treaty’s contested claims provision, related clauses, and the duty of utmost good faith.
Represented a cedent in a life reinsurance dispute involving underlying regulatory settlements and related issues.
Represented a large global reinsurer in recovering a nine-figure damages award in a dispute concerning a host of property reinsurance coverages and the effect of subrogation, salvage and inuring recovery provisions.
Represented cedents in life reinsurance disputes involving coverage issues pertaining to underlying claims involving alleged broker and agent misconduct.
Represented numerous cedents and reinsurers in arbitrations involving a host of traditional reinsurance issues, including follow the fortunes and settlements, allocation, aggregation and number of occurrences, notice and sunset provisions, and utmost good faith.
Star Ins. Co., et al. v. National Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, PA, No. 13-13807 (E.D. Mich. 2013) (obtaining a modification of a preliminary injunction issued against an arbitrator involved in a reinsurance dispute and limiting the scope of the injunction with respect to the arbitrator).
Travelers Casualty & Surety Co. v. Insurance Co. of North America, Nos. 06-4100, 06-4101 (two separate bench trials in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania) aff’d, 609 F.3d 143 (3d Cir. June 9, 2010) (concerning the reasonableness of a reinsurance allocation of certain products/non-products claims under follow form facultative certificates).
ProNational Ins. Co. v. AXA Liabilities Managers, Inc., No. 08-PWG-2022-S (N.D. Ala. Jan. 11, 2010) (motion to compel arbitration of claims brought by a cedent against a claims administrator under the Federal Arbitration Act and the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards).
Seaton Insurance Co., et al. v. Cavell USA, et al., No. 07-cv-7032 (S.D.N.Y. 2008) (granting motion to dismiss complaint in multi-million dollar fraud action).
Suter v. General Accident Ins. Co., 2006 WL 2000881 (D.N.J. July 17, 2006) (verdict in a bench trial for the reinsurer based on bad faith claims handling and the cession of claims that were outside the scope of the reinsured policy).
In re Liquidation of Integrity Ins. Co., 2006 WL 2795343 (N.J. Super. A.D. Oct. 2, 2006), aff’d (N.J. Sup. Ct., Dec. 13, 2007) (representing the Reinsurance Association of America (RAA) in New Jersey state court against an insolvent insurance company’s final distribution plan).
Travelers Cas. & Sur. Co. v. Ace American Reinsurance Co., 392 F. Supp. 2d 659 (S.D.N.Y. 2005), aff’d 2006 WL 2990204 (2d Cir.) (representing a ceding company that prevailed in recovering multi-million dollars claims submitted to its reinsurer).
The Unimax Corporation v. The Continental Ins. Co., et al., No. 2016-cv-279282 (Ga. Sup. Ct. 2017) (granting motion to dismiss environmental insurance coverage action), aff’d (Ga. Ct. App. 2018), cert denied (Ga. Sup. Ct. 2018).
Patrico v. Voya Financial, Inc., et al., No. 16-cv-07070 (S.D.N.Y. 2017) (granting pre-answer motion to dismiss putative class action complaint alleging violation of ERISA based on fees charged for investment advisory services offered to 401(k) plan participants).
Scott v. American Security Ins. Co., et al., Adv. P. No. 16-01195 (S.D.N.Y. Bankr. Ct., 2017), aff’d (S.D.N.Y. June 21, 2018) (granting motion for judgment on the pleadings with respect to purported insured plaintiff/debtor’s adversary complaint, and motion to dismiss cross-claims, without leave to amend, in action alleging various statutory and common law claims related to a property insurance policy).
Harbour House (Bal Harbour) Condominium Association, Inc., as assignee of TRG-Harbour House, LTD v. American International Specialty Lines Insurance Co., et al., No. 15-28921 (Circuit Ct., 11th Judicial District, Miami-Dade Cty, 2016) (obtaining pre-answer dismissal of declaratory judgment action brought by a developer seeking additional insured coverage for an underlying construction defect suit under various primary CGL policies issued to a subcontractor involved in a condominium project).
Morgan Fuel & Heating Co. v. Lexington Ins. Co., et al., No. 272/11 (Sup. Ct., Dutchess Cty., Dec. 21, 2011), aff’d, 2013 WL 1811259 (2d Dep’t 2013) (summary judgment for insurers in a dispute concerning the scope of coverage afforded by the insuring agreement of certain CGL policies and application of the policies' workers' compensation exclusion).
Murphy, et al. v. Allied World Assurance Company (U.S.), Inc., et al., 2009 WL 513747, No. 08-cv-4196 (S.D.N.Y., Mar. 2, 2009), aff’d, 370 Fed. Appx. 193 (2d Cir. 2010) (summary judgment for a D&O excess insurer concerning coverage for the directors and officers of Refco, Inc.).
Pryor v. AGLIC, et al., MRS-L-1740-05 (N.J. Super. Ct., June 22, 2007) (motion to dismiss a claim against a professional liability insurer based on late notice and failure to comply with the provisions of a claim made and reported policy).
Lindow v. Royal Realty Associates, LLC, et al., No. 8588/2014 (N.Y. Sup. Ct., Kings Cty 2018) (in quiet title dispute, obtaining dismissal of fraud and unjust enrichment claims brought against insured by plaintiff seeking to unwind a foreclosure judgment and alleging the misappropriation of real property).
SMI Home Mortgage v. Solano, No. 0381270/2009 (N.Y. Sup. Ct, Bronx Cty 2017) (obtaining judgment in favor of a mortgage servicer declaring an erroneous satisfaction of mortgage null and void, directing the City Register to cancel and discharge said satisfaction of mortgage, and declaring that a CEMA/mortgages are valid and subsisting liens and encumbrances on the subject property).
SMI Home Mortgage v. Clemons, No. 503244/2015 (Sup. Ct., Kings Cty., March 29, 2016) (vacating an erroneous satisfaction of mortgage and obtaining a declaration that the consolidated mortgages at issue are valid and subsisting liens on the subject property).
Brown v. Ocwen Loan Servicing, LLC, et al., No. 14-3454 (D. Md. Aug. 20, 2015), aff’d, 639 Fed. Appx. 200 (4th Cir. 2016) (obtained dismissal for securitized trust’s sponsor and depositor in action alleging fraud, violations of TILA, HOEPA, and RESPA, and various other claims).
Jean-Baptiste v. Saxon Mortgage Services, Inc., et al., No. CAE13-04688 (Prince George's Cty, Circuit Court, July 16, 2015) (obtaining dismissal of lawsuit against servicer/lender alleging violations of TILA, Maryland's Consumer Protection Act, and RESPA and asserting claims of rescission, conversion, wrongful foreclosure, and breach of fiduciary duty).
Craig v. Saxon Mortgage Services, et al., 2015 WL 171234 (E.D.N.Y. 2015) (obtaining dismissal of complaint alleging fraud, unjust enrichment, violations of the FDCPA and TILA, and other claims against lender/mortgage servicer).
Deramo v. Laffey, et al., No. 15061/2011 (Sup. Ct., Queens Cty. 2014) (mortgage servicer not liable in action to determine adverse claims to property under New York’s Real Property and Proceedings Law).
Suero-Sosa v. Saxon Mortgage Services, Inc., 112 A.D.3d 706 (2d Dep’t 2013) (mortgage servicer not liable in tort for a plaintiff’s alleged injuries).
Confidentiality in Reinsurance Arbitrations: What Happens When an Arbitrator Breaches the Nondisclosure Agreement?
Each year, Rob participates in the (Re)insurance Industry “Sleep Out”, a unique charity event that benefits the Covenant House, an organization dedicated to youth homelessness. During the Sleep Out, Rob spends a night at Covenant House, talking with homeless kids and learning how they're building new lives. At midnight, when the kids go to sleep in their beds, Rob and other professionals in the insurance and financial services industry head outside, to spend the night sleeping in cardboard boxes.
This year, Rob personally raised over $6,000 for the event, and the event as a whole raised over $380,000. Over the past 4 years, Rob has raised in excess of $25,000 through his participation in the Sleep Out event. Rob is also involved with Covenant House throughout the year, assisting with job readiness, training, and placement programs. The New York office of Carlton Fields has hosted Covenant House youth programs over the past two years, providing advice, mentoring and insight to the youth as they start their journey into the workforce or pursue their careers. For more information about the event, or to donate, visit www.sleepout.org.

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