Summary Judgment Obtained in Significant Property Damage Case

We won summary judgment in a property damage case involving a fire at our client’s restaurant in 2017. The fire eventually spread to a bakery located next door, causing massive property damage. Through a subrogation action, our client settled with the bakery’s carrier in 2019 for $560,000. In exchange, the bakery’s carrier agreed to indemnify our client “against any and all future claims brought by the bakery for uninsured losses.” Following settlement, the bakery brought suit against our client’s landlord for uninsured losses. The landlord then commenced a third-party action against our client and the bakery’s carrier. We filed for summary judgment against the bakery’s carrier, seeking defense and indemnification pursuant to the 2019 settlement agreement. The bakery’s carrier opposed our motion, arguing the settlement agreement’s indemnity provision only applied to claims made by the bakery against our client. The court was convinced by our arguments and held that the bakery’s carrier’s interpretation of the “Indemnity” provision as limiting the breadth of its obligations to indemnify was not persuasive. This ruling cuts against the courts’ general reluctance to interpret indemnity provisions to include third-party claims when not explicitly stated in the settlement agreement.