Homeowner Lambasts State Farm
SunHerald.com—July 27th, 2010
Thomas “Chris” McIntosh trusted insurance companies before Hurricane Katrina.
He believed they followed the principle on which the industry is based: a policyholder’s money in exchange for the insurer’s intangible promise to pay, promptly and fairly, for future covered losses.
This was the service McIntosh and thousands of other Coast homeowners expected, and were entitled to by law, after Katrina. State Farm Fire & Casualty Co. dashed McIntosh’s beliefs just as surely as Katrina’s winds and storm surge did his home on the Tchoutacabouffa River in Biloxi.
McIntosh told State Farm lawyers in recent pretrial testimony: “My grandfather was in the insurance business. My father was in the insurance business, and I grew up trusting the insurance business. You trusted your banker, you trusted your teacher, you trusted your preacher, and you trusted your insurance man; and you knew if you paid your premiums, they would take care of you.
“And you, as a taxpayer and a citizen, were protected and could lead a safe and happy and healthy life after that. And so I trusted State Farm when they walked in my door, and I had no reason to distrust them. I had trusted them for 20 years, and I trusted them for the year after that they lied to me and defrauded me, and now I probably will never trust anybody again in my life.”
The McIntosh claim is the centerpiece of a federal whistle-blower lawsuit filed against State Farm and two engineering firms that assessed damage for the insurance company, North Carolina–based Forensic Analysis & Engineering Corp. and Texas-based Haag Engineering.
Read more: SunHerald.com
