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September 09, 2001 at 08:00 PM
AEGON Unit Wins Round In Battle With LTC Insurance Marketer
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An AEGON N.V. unit has won a legal battle against an insurance agent who once tried to help it develop a long-term care insurance marketing organization.
A Washington state appeals court has ruled that Peoples Benefit Life Insurance Company, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, can use a Texas state court order to make Dale M. Larson submit to a deposition and produce documents.
The Bothell, Wash., resident had argued that an arbitration agreement between his defunct company, Larson Long Term Care Group L.L.C., and Peoples should keep the dispute out of court, but a three-judge Washington Court of Appeals argued that the Federal Arbitration Act does not apply because neither Larson nor Peoples has formally asked for arbitration.
The court also cited a U.S. Constitution passage that requires states to give “full faith and credit” to the judicial proceedings of other states.
Even if the arbitration act did apply, “Larson provides no authority for the proposition that a federal statute preempts enforcement of an order that must be recognized under the full faith and credit clause of the United States Constitution,” Judge H. Joseph Coleman writes in an opinion for the appeals court.
AEGON representatives were not available for comment.
