Opinion ID: 25144
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Generality of Allegations

Text: On appeal, Farmers contends that (1) the specific allegations made by the claimants against the insured by name trump the general allegations made against all defendants, thereby precluding any duty of Farmers to defend, and (2) the allegations in the underlying lawsuits fall under the policies’ pollution exclusion clauses, likewise alleviating Farmers’s duty to defend. Farmers’s position does not comport neatly with applicable case law or with a common-sense reading of the claimants’ allegations. First, Farmers’s position requires reading “general allegation” to mean an allegation lodged against all defendants generically and “specific allegation” to mean one that targets only 6 Celotex Corp., 477 U.S. at 323. 7 Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc., 530 U.S. 133, 150 (2000). 8 Id. at 151. 4 one particular defendant. As these terms are employed in the case law, however, “general” and “specific” refer to the degree of detail in the substance of the allegation, not to the identity of the party or parties targeted by the allegation.9 Buying into Farmers’s reading would contravene the accepted convention of collectively referring to multiple defendants as “defendants” for the purpose of common allegations. The claimants’ allegations categorized by Farmers as “general” are located in the sections of the complaints entitled “Facts Common to all Causes of Action” and “Negligence.” Most reasonably construed, this suggests that the claimants are alleging facts against all defendants as a convenient shorthand in lieu of redundantly re-alleging the same facts against each defendant by name. Even if the proposition relied on by Farmers might make sense in a case comprising a single plaintiff, a single defendant, and a single subject matter, it does not comport with the situation in the underlying lawsuits, which comprise multiple plaintiffs, multiple defendants, and a large variety of claims. Moreover, the allegations against all defendants and the 9 Cf. Monsanto v. Milam, 494 S.W.2d 534 (Tex. 1973) (specific pleading of facts giving rise to negligence controlled over general allegation of negligence); Chuck Wagon Feeding Co., Inc. v. Davis, 768 S.W.2d 360 (Tex. App. – El Paso 1989) (holding that specific allegations control where plaintiff generally alleged breach of contract, but then proceeded to specifically allege the exact terms of the breached contracts). 5 allegations against the insured by name are not limiting or mutually exclusive of each other. Read most reasonably, the allegations against all defendants include the insured and are complementary to the allegations against the insured individually, by name. As such, Farmers’s duty to defend is not precluded by the form of the claimants’ allegations.