Here is a NJ case on legal malpractice insurance coverage for retired partners who continue handling certain matters.

"Thanks to ambiguous and vague policy language, a professional liability carrier will have to cover a law firm partner for malpractice allegedly committed after he left an insured firm, a New Jersey appeals court says.

The judges ruled on May 25 that where a policy limited coverage for a firm’s retired partners but not for partners who still practiced law and handled cases referred by the firm, the policy would be read against the carrier, Zurich Specialties London Limited.

"Zurich could have utilized policy language that would have eliminated all ambiguity and which would have put the matter beyond all reasonable question," the judges wrote in Jolley v. Marquess, A-4513-0. "Zurich did not do so; therefore, we construe the ambiguity in favor of coverage, which is the approach long favored in this state."

The judges noted, however, "Our own research, and that of the parties, yields no reported decisions in this state construing this policy language."

In 1997, John Marquess, a partner at what was then Marquess, Morrison and Trimble in Turnersville, N.J., represented defendant Barbara Gorna in an automobile accident case. The case was assigned by Gorna’s insurer, American Independent Insurance Co., a client of the firm.

In 2000, Marquess was bought out by his two partners but, with their consent, continued to represent Gorna as a Haddonfield, N.J., solo. No substitution of attorney appears to have been filed.

The same year, a jury found Gorna 100 percent liable for the injuries to the plaintiff, Kimberly Jolley. Without Gorna’s consent, Marquess entered into an agreement with Jolley’s attorney that Gorna would pay Jolley $750,000, plus interest, in damages. Marquess told Gorna she would not be responsible for the judgment above her $15,000 coverage limit, but that was not stated in the agreement.