Fairfield Connecticut Building Expert Directory

Harmon Tower Construction Defects Update: Who’s To Blame?

August 17, 2011 — CDJ STAFF

Reporting on the site VegasInc.com, Liz Benton notes that “nobody wants to take the fall for what happened at Harmon.” Work on the Harmon hotel building in Las Vegas’s CityCenter stopped in 2008 after 26 of the planned 49 stories were completed. Lorence Slutzky, a construction law professor at John Marshall Law School and a partner with the Chicago firm Robbins Schwartz Nicholas Lifton & Taylor told Benton that while inspectors and others are complicit, “the real responsibility rests with Perini, which has an obligation to comply with the plan specifications.” Perini’s claim is that they were given faulty design drawings. MGM disputes this.

Perini has offered to repair the building defects, however MGM has released a statement that they have “zero confidence or trust that Perini can and will properly fix a building it has so badly constructed thus far.” One MGM spokesperson likened these requests from Perini to “the director of ‘Ishar’ demanding a sequel.” “Ishtar,’ cost Columbia Pictures $55 million dollars and earned only $4.2 million in its initial run. Perini claims that MGM halted work because of the economy.

Read the full story…

Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of

Federal Court Holds that Demolition Exclusion Does Not Apply and Carrier Has Duty to Defend Additional Insureds

September 02, 2024 — Craig Rokuson - Traub Lieberman
In the recent case of Travelers Indem. Co. v. Trisura Specialty Ins. Co., 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 101953 (S.D.N.Y. June 7, 2024), the court had occasion to consider the classic additional insured fact pattern of a construction accident. Travelers insured the general contractor and provided a defense to the general contractor as well as its wholly owned subsidiary. Trisura insured the subcontractor, who employed the injured worker. Travelers brought suit, alleging that Trisura is obligated to defend and indemnify the general contractor, its subsidiary, the owner of the building (The City of New York), and the tenant. Trisura denied any obligation to provide coverage due to the application of the “Demolition Exclusion” to the Trisura policy, which provides, in part, that there is no coverage for injury or damage arising out of the demolition of any building or structure which has original ground height in excess of three stories. The accident occurred during the interior demolition of the fifth floor of the building. The court held that the Demolition Exclusion applies only when there is a complete tearing down, razing, or destruction of an entire building. As the accident occurred during interior demolition, the exclusion did not apply. Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Craig Rokuson, Traub Lieberman
Mr. Rokuson may be contacted at crokuson@tlsslaw.com

Congratulations to BWB&O’s Los Angeles Office on Another Successful MSJ!

July 11, 2022 — Dolores Montoya - Bremer Whyte Brown & O'Meara LLP
Bremer Whyte Brown & O’Meara, LLP is proud to announce Partner Daniel Crespo and Associate Stefon Jackson successfully argued and won a Motion for Summary Judgment (“MSJ”) for our client, a property owner of an apartment complex. Plaintiff was involved in a physical altercation with one of the tenants at an apartment complex owned by our client. Plaintiff alleged that our client had notice of a propensity for violence claiming that there were prior instances of contentious interactions between this particular tenant and Plaintiff. As a result, Plaintiff alleged that our client had a duty to prevent further interactions between Plaintiff and the tenant presuming that an act of physical violence was reasonably foreseeable. Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Dolores Montoya, Bremer Whyte Brown & O'Meara LLP

Kentucky Court Upholds Arbitration Award, Denies Appeal

June 15, 2011 — CDJ STAFF

The Kentucky Court of Appeals has ruled in Lake Cumberland Community Action Agency v. CMW, Inc. affirming the arbitration award. CMW, Inc. was responsible for the construction of a facility to be used for pre-school students and the housing of Alzheimer patients and senior citizens. An agreement was made that any disputes would be heard by an arbitrator selected by the construction industry.

The plaintiff alleged that there were design and construction defects in the building trusses, violation of the Kentucky Building Code, and problems with the HVAC system. The arbitrator awarded $106,000 to the plaintiff which then sought to vacate the award. The circuit court upheld the arbitrator’s decision.

The Court of Appeals found that there was no basis for rejecting the arbitrator’s decision, noting “there is nothing to show that there was any fraud or bias on the part of the arbitrator.” The appeals court, with all three judges concurring, upheld the arbitration award.

Read the court’s decision

Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of

“For What It’s Worth”

October 21, 2024 — Daniel Lund III - Lexology
The legal doctrine of quantum meruit is essentially referring to recovering “for what it’s worth,” incorporating the Latin phrase for “as much as one has deserved.” Quantum meruit recovery occurs when there is no contract between parties for the particular item for which recovery is sought. Hence, quantum meruit recovery is generally a means of last resort to endeavor to make oneself whole. So, it was for a subcontractor seeking nearly $14,000,000 for work it performed on a construction project in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The subcontractor sued on contract as well as quantum meruit/unjust enrichment. The court initially dismissed the quantum meruit/unjust enrichment claims – because there was a contract claim – whereupon the contract claim was dismissed on summary judgment: the subcontractor failed to timely submit change proposals and, consequently, “lost contract remedies available to recover amounts it sought in the change proposals.” Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Daniel Lund III, Phelps
Mr. Lund may be contacted at daniel.lund@phelps.com

Court Finds That SIR Requirements are Not Incorporated into High Level Excess Policies and That Excess Insurers’ Payment of Defense Costs is Not Conditioned on Actual Liability

April 22, 2019 — Christopher Kendrick & Valerie A. Moore – Haight Brown & Bonesteel LLP
In Deere & Co. v. Allstate Ins. Co. (No. A145170, filed 2/25/19), a California appeals court held that the insured was not required to pay additional self-insured retentions (SIRs) in order to trigger higher level excess coverage because the retained limits applicable to the first layer of coverage did not also apply to the higher-layer excess policies. In Deere, the insured was sued for injuries from alleged exposure to asbestos-containing assemblies used in Deere machines. In a declaratory relief action against its umbrella and excess insurers, the case was tried on: (1) whether the higher-layer excess policies were triggered once the first-layer excess policy limits, which were subject to an SIR paid by Deere, had been exhausted; and (2) whether the insurers’ indemnity obligation extended to Deere’s defense costs incurred in asbestos claims that had been dismissed. The trial court found in favor of the insurers, concluding that the retained limits in the first layer of coverage also applied to the higher-layer excess, which was not triggered until Deere paid additional SIRs. The court also concluded that the insurers were not obligated to pay defense costs when underlying cases were dismissed without payment to a claimant either by judgment or settlement. Mr. Kendrick may be contacted at ckendrick@hbblaw.com Ms. Moore may be contacted at vmoore@hbblaw.com Reprinted courtesy of Christopher Kendrick, Haight Brown & Bonesteel LLP and Valerie A. Moore, Haight Brown & Bonesteel LLP Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of

EEOC Focuses on Eliminating Harassment, Recruitment and Hiring Barriers in the Construction Industry

September 09, 2024 — Aaron C. Schlesinger & Stephen E. Irving - Peckar & Abramson, P.C.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), whose mission is to enforce the nation’s anti-discrimination laws, released new guidelines on June 18, 2024, entitled Promising Practices for Preventing Harassment in the Construction Industry. The guidelines are in support of its Strategic Enforcement Plan for the fiscal years 2024-2028 for combatting systemic harassment and eliminating barriers in recruitment and hiring in the construction industry. With these guidelines, the EEOC has identified harassment as an ongoing issue in the construction industry, and that immediate attention and resolution is required. The EEOC specifically recommends that the following five core principles that it has found effective in preventing and addressing harassment be implemented by construction industry employers:

Committed and engaged leadership;
Consistent and demonstrated accountability;
Strong and comprehensive harassment policies;
Trusted and accessible complaint procedures; and
Regular, interactive training tailored to the audience and the organization.

Reprinted courtesy of Aaron C. Schlesinger, Peckar & Abramson, P.C. and Stephen E. Irving, Peckar & Abramson, P.C. Mr. Schlesinger may be contacted at aschlesinger@pecklaw.com Mr. Irving may be contacted at sirving@pecklaw.com Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of

California Court of Appeal Makes Short Work Trial Court Order Preventing Party From Supplementing Experts

August 06, 2019 — Garret Murai - California Construction Law Blog
Years ago I recommended to a client that we hire a construction defect expert in a case. The client, a thrifty fellow, responded, “But I thought you were the construction expert. Why do I need to hire another expert? A fair question and one that caught me flat footed. Whether I’m an “expert” or not can be debated, but I explained to the client that while I was an attorney whose practice focused on construction law, I was not someone who he would want to take the stand and testify about the engineering design and seismic stability of pilings. For that, he needed an expert. In construction litigation it’s not uncommon for parties and their attorneys to hire “experts.” There are even special rules set forth in the California Code of Civil Procedure for disclosing, supplementing and deposing experts, which basically provide as follows: 1. Demand for Exchange of Expert Information: After the court sets a trial date in a case, any party may demand that each party exchange information concerning the experts they intend to have testify at trial; Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Garret Murai, Wendel, Rosen, Black & Dean LLP
Mr. Murai may be contacted at gmurai@wendel.com

FAIRFIELD CONNECTICUT BUILDING EXPERT DIRECTORY AND CAPABILITIES