American International Group and a group of its companies have filed a new, amended complaint against Dellwood Insurance Group, started earlier this year by a group of former AIG executives.
The lawsuit filed July 10 in U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey is the latest development in mammoth insurer’s litigation against startup Dellwood that began in April, about a month after Dellwood announced its launch.
Related: AIG Sues Newly Launched Dellwood Insurance and Its Founders
AIG said it seeks to “stop and obtain redress and compensation for Dellwood’s ongoing misconduct,” including the alleged misappropriation of AIG trade secrets and confidential information.
The amended complaint by AIG also clarifies its reasoning for dropping Michael Price, Kean Driscoll, and Thomas Connolly as individual defendants. Price and Driscoll are now CEO and CUO, respectively, of Dellwood, formed for P/C wholesale brokers with a focus on small- and middle-enterprise risks in direct competition with AIG’s excess & surplus lines insurers. Connolly is Dellwood’s CFO.
Price was AIG’s CEO of North America General Insurance, Driscoll was AIG’s global chief underwriting officer of General Insurance, and Connolly was chief financial officer of AIG’s North America General Insurance before resigning.
AIG said its individual claims against the trio were “backed by strong evidence” but were dropped after the former executives’ intention to go into arbitration, delaying the claims against Dellwood. AIG said it dismissed the claims to “avoid unnecessary delays” and make sure its claims against Dellwood were addressed with full discovery.
A Dellwood spokesperson previously said AIG dropped the claims only because there “was no factual basis” for them. “Any suggestion otherwise is meritless,” said the spokesperson. Dellwood filed a motion to end AIG’s lawsuit against it. The motion was dismissed, according to court records, and the new insurer was given until the end of July to answer the amended complaint.
AIG’s newest complaint blasts Price, Driscoll, and Connolly for using knowledge of AIG’s strategy for its E&S business, finances, underwriting and customers to start Dellwood, which is allegedly “using AIG’s know-how, personnel, business model, and confidential information to attempt to replicate AIG’s E&S insurance business and unfairly compete against AIG,” the company said.
AIG continued to allege Price and Driscoll violated employment agreements prohibiting them from competing against AIG. Connolly’s alleged infractions include allegedly soliciting other AIG employees, and acting as “a mole and double agent” for Dellwood while still at AIG, who alleged Connolly forwarded confidential information to his personal email.
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