Last week, Tom Hanks and his wife, Rita Wilson, filed suit against their long time insurance broker. The complaint, filed in the Superior Court for the County of Los Angeles, contains ten claims, including professional negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, conversion, and unjust enrichment.
Hanks and Wilson recently switched brokers, and the new broker determined that the insurance premiums charged for policies over the last two years “appeared extraordinarily high for the coverage provided.” The bases for the claims involve the following allegations:
a. Misrepresenting their ability to procure coverage for Plaintiffs by, for example, failing to advise Plaintiffs that they did not have the authority to seek appointments with insurance carriers, thereby precluding them from the ability to directly procure coverage;
b. Illegally issuing certificates of insurance without appointments;
c. Charging Plaintiffs premiums for insurance never procured and/or charging Plaintiffs more than the quoted premium for coverage procured;
d. Binding unnecessarily duplicative insurance coverage; and
e. Covering up their predatory embezzlement scheme through manipulation and deceit.
The amount of damages Hanks and Wilson are requesting has not yet been determined, but the complaint states that they believe the broker’s wrongful conduct and failure to perform his duties, as well his fraud, theft and embezzlement, has cost Hanks and Wilson “hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars.”
An example of life mimicking art:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yil2jWQ5Oqg%3Frel%3D0
