A Virginia State Court judge has recently confirmed the insurer St. Paul Fire and Marine’s denial of Hitt Contracting $ 24 Million Claim, which was allegedly damaged during an expansion of the museum completed in 2018, saying that the contractor did not meet the specific notification requirement of the Its policy.
Hitt, based on Falls, said that the judge ignored many evidence that he deserved insurance coverage and said he appealed the decision and hopes a decision by the appeal court in early 2026.
The judge’s ruling provides his summary of how the unusual case occurred.
In 2014, Hitt Contracting had won the first $ 200 million expansion of Gwathmey Siegel’s Gwathmey Museum, designed by Glnstone de Potomac, MD.
Glnstone counted for $ 36 million. The museum stated that Hitt’s work and the SUMs had caused significant damage, including numerous ceiling leaks and imported glass panels.
Hitt had a primary liability insurance coat of $ 2 million, a first over -dollars of excess insurance of $ 25 million and a second layer of excess at the top for $ 25 million , with St. Paul.
One day before a judgment on the alleged damage to the building had to begin in June 2023, Hitt and Glnstone settled for a total of $ 51 million from Hitt and their insurers. Primary insurer and first level of insurer agreed to pay $ 12 million combined and Hitt agreed to pay $ 21 million, but Hitt sought $ 24 million in St. Paul, an amount that would have covered Hitt loss.
But St. Paul refused to pay.
Part of the recent decision that defended the denied lawsuit was based on the analysis of Judge David Oblon of SI Hitt had exhausted lower level policies before claiming St. Paul. But the judge stood essentially in his hands and said he would find out that he would end up guessing, so he based his decision on the notification.
The fact that the case was decided to oblon, in a bank trial, was also unusual, because the case had been decided by a jury. The jury’s trial was abandoned because Hitt was working on a project in Fairfax., Va., Justouse where the insurance case was attempted and there was concern, first maid for the Museum’s lawyers, that the jury could interpret the jury. Hitt’s work “in court as an implicit approval of Hitt by the court.
The decision of the Judge Oblon was an interpretation of the notification provisions in the insurance policy and the interaction between Hitt and St. Paul. What happened in 2018 and 2019 was crucial. Hitt did not notify Saint Paul when Glnstone made his consideration against Hitt in October 2018, he wrote Oblon. Without prior notice the following year, Hitt and Glenstone mediated their dispute without success. Glnstone had offered to conform to $ 11 million plus the resignation of $ 18 million from Hitt for unpaid jobs, he wrote.
One week after the mediation failed, “and five months after Glnstone filed his claim,” Hitt notified to his agent the possible claim in Sant Pau.
“Hitt notified St. Paul a possible insurance claim?” No, he ruled, and this only “orders the judgment in favor of St. Paul.”
Hitt says Oblon made numerous mistakes.
“The Judgment Judge,” the company says in a statement, “ignored the tests that are unustency, without amount and stipulated that show excess insurance coverage against St. Paul by virtue of policies in the following basis where primary carriers And the first covered Hitt’s claims. “
