UNITED STATES
Lexology

Sedgwick LLP

Cara Vecchione
USA March 7 2017

In Nat’l Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, PA v. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, No. 653575/2014, 2017 WL 748834 (N.Y. Sup. Ct., N.Y. Cty. February 27, 2017), a New York trial court held that the Diocese must pay multiple self-insured retentions per year — one per occurrence — in a coverage dispute involving claims that foster care agencies affiliated with the Diocese negligently placed ten children with an abusive foster mother over a twenty-two year period.

The trial court tracked the reasoning of the Court of Appeals in a separate coverage dispute concerning claims of sexual abuse by a priest, Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Nat’l Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, PA, 21 N.Y.3d 139 (2013). In Diocese of Brooklyn, the Court of Appeals made clear that the “unfortunate event” test should be…