What Does an Insurance Lawyer Do?

Lawyer's liability insurance covers legal liability for any negligence, mistake or omission in professional services within the scope of the insured or his predecessor as a lawyer, including all insults, defamation and the insured Personal injury or property damage to or caused to a third party at work. Lawyer liability insurance is a new type of insurance in China.

Lawyer Liability Insurance

According to the provisions of the lawyer's liability insurance clause in China's insurance market, the insurance liability of lawyer's liability insurance includes: the insured person within the retrospective period or insurance period specified in the insurance policy schedule, within the territory of the People's Republic of China (Hong Kong, Macao, (Except Taiwan) when engaging in litigation or non-litigation attorney business, the client's economic loss due to negligence or negligence, and the client's first claim for compensation to the insured within the insurance period, the insured shall bear economic compensation in accordance with the law In case of liability, the insurer shall be responsible for compensation. ^[1]

The exclusion of lawyers' liability insurance, in addition to the exclusion of general liability insurance, mainly includes the following: ^[1]

Regarding the right of participation of insurers, lawyers' liability insurance is basically the same as medical liability insurance. ^[2]

The law profession is a high-risk industry. As the state's accountability of law firms gradually transitions from administrative punishment to civil liability, law firms must independently assume legal and economic responsibilities. And to insure "lawyer's liability insurance" with insurance companies is an effective way to resolve risks in line with international practice. ^[3]

Case 1: The judge of the second instance in a lawyer's practice liability insurance dispute case

case

Appellant (defendant in the first instance): Ping An Property & Casualty Insurance Co., Ltd. Shanghai Branch (hereinafter referred to as "Ping An Company")

Appellee (plaintiff in the original trial): Shanghai and Shanghai Law Firm (pseudonym, hereinafter referred to as Shanghai)

The Shanghai Lawyers Association and Ping An Company signed the "Unified Insurance Contract Insurance Insurance Contract for Lawyers", which stipulates that Ping An Company will uniformly protect the lawyers' legal responsibilities of all lawyers registered in the Shanghai Bar Association. The relevant contract clauses state that: the insured is a legal practice of all law firms affiliated to the Shanghai Bar Association, and the registered practising lawyers of the insured handle the litigations and non-litigations on behalf of the insured as clients in China as practising lawyers. In the course of lawyers' business, after the beginning of the specified retrospective period, due to negligent acts, violations of the Lawyer Law or the agreement of the entrusted contract, causing the client to suffer economic losses, the insured shall bear the financial compensation liability, and the insured If a claim is filed within the insurance period, Ping An will be responsible for compensation; the insurance period starts at 12 noon on February 18, 2004 and ends at 12 noon on February 18, 2005, and the retrospective period is 6 years before the start date of insurance Ping An Company is responsible for compensating the litigation costs and other necessary and reasonable expenses paid by the insured with its written consent; however, registered lawyers who accept the business without the consent of the insured and cause the client's economic loss shall not be compensated.

A Shanghai office is the insured person of the "Union Lawyer Liability Insurance Comprehensive Insurance Contract" signed by Shanghai Lawyers Association and Ping An Company. In July 2005, a Shanghai office signed a contract with an outsider, Shanghai Hongqiao Parking Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Hongqiao Company"), to agree to accept the employment of Hongqiao Company by a Shanghai office and assign Zhu Zhu, a lawyer in the office. A lawsuit was filed against the company in relation to the sale of the house. After that, Zhu collected the original litigation materials provided by Hongqiao Company and the litigation costs of the case. Due to Zhu's failure to sue in time, the time limit for the lawsuit was exceeded, causing economic losses to Hongqiao Company. Hongqiao Company then filed a lawsuit in the court, demanding compensation from Shanghai. After the first and second trials of this case, the court held that the contract text alleged by Hu was a misappropriation by Zhu, and the content of the contract had not been reviewed by the firm. It was an internal management issue of the firm and did not affect his behavior as a post. Identified. In view of Zhu's commitment to jointly bear the civil compensation liability with the Shanghai office, the Shanghai office and the Zhu were sentenced to jointly compensate Hongqiao Company for economic losses.

After the above-mentioned judgment of Shanghai's compensation case took effect, Shanghai-based company reported the case to Ping An Company and demanded compensation, but it was rejected. Hu Mou appealed to the court and requested that Ping An Company pay the corresponding amount of Hu Mou.

The defendant Ping An Company argued that: Hu Mou had stated in a dispute over its legal service contract with Hong Qiao Company that Zhu Mou had misappropriated the "Attending Lawyer Contract" of Hu Mou and the contract had not been reviewed by Hu Mou. Accept business. Accordingly, according to the exclusion clause of the insurance contract, Ping An Company was not required to perform its compensation obligation, and therefore requested to dismiss the lawsuit of Shanghai Stock Exchange.

[Trial]

The court of first instance held that in the first and second judgments in the case of Hongqiao Company v. Shanghai for a legal service contract dispute, it was determined that Zhu's acceptance of the litigation was an act of duty. Zhu's gross negligence caused Hongqiao's economic losses to be caused by Shanghai. A certain firm compensated, and a practising lawyer of the Shanghai certain firm suffered economic losses due to its negligence when it was entrusted to handle litigation business. It is an insured accident as stipulated in the "Underwriters Liability Insurance Unified Insurance Contract", so Ping An Company shall be liable for compensation. Based on this, the court of first instance ruled that Ping An Company was responsible for insurance claims and compensated Shanghai for related losses. After the first trial, Ping An appealed against it. The court of second instance held that: the effective judgment of Hong Qiao Company v. Shanghai Law Office and Zhu Mou's legal service contract dispute ordered Shanghai Law Office to bear civil liability to Hong Qiao Company for Zhu's behavior, but the effective judgment did not Whether to accept the entrustment without authorization to make a determination. Relevant evidence shows that Zhu was in the name of the appellee without authorization to sign a contract with Hongqiao to hire a lawyer. The disputes in the insurance contract shall be judged in accordance with the relevant provisions of the insurance contract. The insurance contract signed by Ping An Company and the Shanghai Lawyers Association stipulates that if the registered lawyer has accepted the business in private without the consent of the insured, causing economic losses to the client, he shall not be liable for compensation. Therefore, the court of second instance ruled: 1. the judgment of the first instance was revoked; 2. the litigation request of the Shanghai and Shanghai law firm of the appellee was not supported.

[Comment]

The focus of the dispute in this case can be analyzed from three aspects:

First, the statement made by the appellee in another case does not constitute an admission of facts in this case. In the trial of this case, Ping An Company had argued that in the case of a dispute over the legal service contract between Shanghai Office and Hongqiao Company, Zhu had already admitted that Zhu had signed an outside contract to hire an attorney in the name of Shanghai Office of the Appellee, which was a privately accepted lawsuit The agency's attitude is not only a defense of Hong Qiao's claim, but also a statement of objective facts, so the facts should be confirmed accordingly. Ping An's arguing opinion actually refers to the fact that the Shanghai office has admitted to the fact that Zhu has accepted the business privately. Self-recognition is the recognition by the parties of the facts against the party claimed by the other party in the lawsuit. The facts of self-recognition do not require the parties to prove by evidence. Article 8 of the "Several Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Evidence in Civil Proceedings" (hereinafter referred to as the "Evidence Provisions") is a provision on the self-recognition system. It is generally believed that self-recognition should have the following requirements: (1) must be a statement of the facts by the parties; (2) must be made in the course of the lawsuit; (3) must be consistent with the factual claims of the opposite party; (4) self-recognition is An unfavorable statement. Therefore, the parties' recognition of a certain fact outside the lawsuit can only be used as a kind of evidence to be the object of the judge's comprehensive judgment, and it does not have the self-confided binding force in the lawsuit. Even if the parties' confession in litigation occurred in other cases, it is still an out-of-suit recognition for the case being tried, and does not have the effect of confession. Specific to this case, although the legal service contract dispute between Shanghai and Hongqiao Company of Shanghai and its law office, Zhu Mou published the text of the contract of misappropriation of Shanghai and Shanghai law firm. The legal service contract has not been reviewed by Shanghai and Xu, and Zhu accepted the business privately, etc. Litigation opinions, but these statements were not made in the litigation procedure of this case, nor were they directly acknowledgement of the unfavorable facts. Therefore, they cannot be regarded as the self-confidence of the relevant facts by Hu Mou and cannot be made on the basis of the disadvantages of Hu Mou The verdict.

Secondly, the fact that the court has not judged in the effective ruling of another case cannot be taken as the fact of the decision in this case. According to Article 9 (4) of the "Evidence Regulations", "the facts confirmed by the ruling in which the people's court has legal effect" need not be proved by the parties. Therefore, for the same fact, if the effective decision of another case has been found, there is no need to prove it again objectively. In order to prevent the court from making conflicting determinations on the same fact, unless the contrary evidence is sufficient to overturn, the parties are generally not required to prejudge the decision. The facts are proved by proof. However, the facts of the pre-determination must be the facts clearly identified by the ruling in the effective case of another case, and not the facts that involve only relevant content but have not been confirmed in the grounds of the judgment. As in this case, although in the case of a dispute over the legal service contract between a Shanghai office and Hongqiao Company, the court clearly determined that Zhu's act of accepting the commission, signing the contract, and collecting litigation fees was an act performed on behalf of Shanghai, that is, his behavior was a post Behavior, but the determination is only a judgment on the facts from the perspective of the actor and the subject of civil liability and does not involve the determination of the internal relationship between Zhu and Shanghai. The reason that the case ruled that the Shanghai office was responsible for civil compensation to Hong Qiao Company for Zhu s behavior was mainly because Zhu signed a contract with Hong Qiao Company in the name of Shanghai Office, and the consequences of the damage should be The counterparty of the contract, namely, Shanghai, will bear the burden externally. In fact, the court has also pointed out that as to whether the contract text is misappropriated by Zhu, whether the contract content has been reviewed by the firm, and whether the litigation fees collected by the individual are transferred to the firm, they are all internal management issues of Shanghai. Determination of civil liability of an external institution. In other words, the case of the dispute over the legal service contract between Shanghai and Hongqiao did not actually make corresponding factual determination as to whether Zhu was the one who accepted Hongqiao's litigation agency business in private. Therefore, this case finally concluded that Zhu was the one who accepted Hongqiao's privately. Litigation agency business is not inconsistent with the determination and handling of the previous case.

Thirdly, according to the relevant performance of the insured in litigation and insurance claims, it can be confirmed that Zhu Mou signed the contract with Hong Qiao Company to hire a lawyer in the name of the insured without authorization. In this case, on the one hand, the court of second instance denied that the statement made by Hu in the other case constituted a self-confession. On the other hand, it did not consider that the facts to be proved in this case had been prejudged in another case. The attorney accepted the business privately, and the matter of whether Ping An Company should be exempted was re-identified. Specifically, the court consolidated the statements made by Shanghai and Zhu in separate cases, the insurance claims contact records of Shanghai and Ping An, and combined with the fact that Zhu did not hand over the litigation costs entrusted by Hong Qiao to Shanghai. The facts received by a certain person finally determined that Zhu was a privately accepted Hongqiao company's litigation agency business, which should be said to be closer to the objective facts and in line with the original true meaning of the appellant Hu Mou in this case.

This case is an insurance contract dispute dispute. Related matters shall be subject to the terms agreed in the contract between the two parties. In the "Public Law Liability Insurance Underwriting Insurance Contract" concluded by Ping An Company and Shanghai Lawyers Association, the "registration practising lawyers' private acceptance of business without the insured's consent and causing economic losses to their clients" have been clearly listed. Into the exclusion clause. The purpose of this clause is for insurance companies to control the underwriting risks and urge law firms to strengthen the management of the professional ethics and practice discipline of the lawyers they hire to reduce and eliminate additional insurance claims arising from violations of the practice of lawyers or the agency of legally-entrusted matters. Liability is legal and effective. Therefore, on the premise that a practicing lawyer in Shanghai has accepted the business privately, Ping An Company refused to assume the insurance claims liability of this case based on the clause of the liability stipulated in the contract, which is well-founded and should be supported.