Opinion ID: 1747492
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the public policy interest of protecting consumers from insurance fraud

Text: The question remains, however, whether the plaintiff has asserted a well defined and established public policy as the basis for his retaliatory discharge claim. [4] Mr. Guy relies on the legislature's enactment of the Tennessee Insurance Law as evidence of a clear expression of the public policy in this state with respect to protecting the public from the fraudulent activity of insurance agents. Specifically, he relies upon section 56-6-155, which lists the various grounds for which the Insurance Commissioner can suspend or revoke an agent's license, as well as assess an agent with a civil penalty. In response, Mutual argues that because there is no statutory duty in this provision requiring an agent to report unlawful activity by other agents, the plaintiff has not demonstrated that Mutual violated a clear public policy evidenced by an unambiguous constitutional, statutory or regulatory provision. Therefore, Mutual alleges, the plaintiff has failed to establish the clear public policy necessary to form the basis of a retaliatory discharge claim. Our inquiry, however, is not limited to whether a particular law or regulation has been violated; rather, our inquiry focuses on whether some important public policy interest embodied in the law has been furthered by the whistleblowing activity. Gutierrez v. Sundancer Indian Jewelry, 117 N.M. 41, 868 P.2d 1266, 1273 (1993) (citations omitted). Indeed, in an early decision by this Court, we recognized the public policy interest behind encouraging insurance companies and others interested to bring to the attention of the Insurance Commissioner the derelictions of agents: Many painful cases come before the courts where ... people have given up their scanty earnings without profit to themselves or to their beneficiaries because of unauthorized misrepresentations by unscrupulous agents as to the terms and effect of insurance contracts such agents were writing. The interest of the people as a whole ... requires a supervision of agents authorized to solicit and write life insurance. Only [persons] of good character should be permitted to pursue such a calling and dishonest and unreliable [persons] should be debarred from such a calling. Independent Life Ins. Co. v. Rodgers, 165 Tenn. 447, 458, 55 S.W.2d 767, 770 (1933). Such a clear declaration of public policy warrants our holding that an agent of an insurance company, who seeks to ensure compliance with the rules and regulations governing insurance agents, cannot be discharged without being furnished a cause of action for retaliatory discharge.