RECENT FEDERAL DECISIONS

August 2008

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First Circuit Holds Owned-Property Exclusion Does Not Prohibit Recovery under Insurance Policy for Remediation where Contamination Is Migrating Off-Site
Boston Gas Company v. Century Indemnity Company, ___F.3d___

Plaintiff brought suit against the defendant in U.S. District Court seeking a declaratory judgment as to the defendant’s obligations under an insurance policy and costs associated with clean-up of environmental contamination that occurred over a number of decades. Defendant argued that plaintiff’s damages should be allocated between all of its policies during that time and, in any event, that the insurance policy excluded remediation done to the plaintiff’s land. The First Circuit certified the issue of insurance allocation to the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts and held that remediation of the insured’s property might be covered by the policy if the remediation is necessary to address migration of the contamination off-site.