Alliant Wins California Jury Trial

By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Weekly News -- A Fresno, California, jury has delivered a verdict completely in favor of insurance brokerage firm Alliant Insurance Services and ten of its insurance producers after a lengthy trial. On March 22, the jury rejected every claim by Aon against its competitor, Alliant, and ten former Aon employees, including breach of fiduciary duty, aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty, breach of loyalty, intentional interference with contracts, and misappropriation of trade secrets.

The case arose from a 2014 departure of ten producers followed by other employees from Aon's Fresno, Salinas, and Walnut Creek offices. After hearings in both California and New York courts, Alliant initially prevailed when a New York court both rejected Aon's request for injunctive relief and held that California law applied to the dispute, followed by the California court's 2015 ruling that Aon's non-compete agreements were unenforceable under California law.

Aon argued the departures were a "raid" orchestrated by a conspiracy. But halfway through an eight-week trial, Aon dropped half of its claims. The Fresno jury ruled in favor of Alliant and rejected Aon's remaining claims after less than five hours of deliberation.

Morgan Lewis partners Debra Fischer, Michael Banks, and Seth Gerber led counsel for Alliant and its California employees, supported by of-counsel Jeffrey Arrington and Robert Brundage and associates Adam Wagmeister, Ainsley Carreno, David Rosenberg, Joseph Marra, Karen Cho, and Claire Lesikar and Morgan Lewis partner Timothy Stephens in New York, with associates Matthew R. Ladd and Stephen Scotch-Marmo. About Alliant Insurance Services Headquartered in Newport Beach, CA, Alliant Insurance Services, Inc. provides property and casualty, workers' compensation, employee benefits, surety, and financial products and services to clients nationwide, including public entities, tribal nations, healthcare, energy, law firms, real estate, construction, and other industry groups. More information is available on the company's web site at www.alliant.com. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170330005854/en/

Keywords for this news article include: Legal Issues, Alliant Insurance Services Inc..

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