A New Mexico jury has awarded Public Underwriters Liability Insurance Company (PULIC) $52 million in punitive damages, finding the insurer violated the Unfair Practices Act in a bad faith insurance claim after a decade of litigation.
On January 17, an Albuquerque jury determined that PULIC, a subsidiary of The Doctors Company, willfully violated the Unfair Practices Act and acted with reckless disregard for the interests of the insured. According to the joint final pretrial order issued by the Second Judicial District in Bernadillo County, PULIC is an insurance company in Washington, DC that provides medical professional liability insurance to “high risk” physicians who cannot obtain insurance in the standard market due to their past claims history.
