Swiss Re was bound by the WilProp form, limiting its exposure to the destruction of the World Trade Center to a single event payout, the jury in the WTC insurance trial has found.
The decision on lead insurer Swiss Re, which comes after a partial verdict last week that insurers representing $1.06bn of the complex’s insurance programme were also bound by Wilprop, represents another blow to Larry Silverstein’s campaign to have the events of September 11 2001 treated a two events.
Should the verdict withstand the expected challenges from Silverstein’s legal team, the WTC leaseholder will be able to collect a maximum of $4.68bn, rather than the $7bn he was seeking.
The jury also found that insurers representing $176m of the insurance programme for the WTC site were not bound by WilProp.
A further ten insurers will now enter the second stage of the legal process to determine which form or forms bound them, and whether the attacks were defined as one or two events.
Commenting on the jury’s decision, Larry Silverstein said: “Of course, I am disappointed that the jury did not see things our way with respect to most of the insurers in the WTC coverage.
But he said he was determined to proceed with rebuilding the ground zero site, with part of the complex due to be ready for occupancy at the end of 2005.
He added: “We are ready to move on to the second phase of the trial against ten insurers with more than a billion dollars worth of per occurrence coverage.
“We feel the evidence is strongly in our favour and look forward to our next day in court. And we're looking forward to the day when this litigation ends so we can focus all of our attention on rebuilding.
