Cozen O’Connor members William P. Shelley, Alicia Curran and Lori S. Nugent recently participated in the BVR Legal Bad Faith Conference in New York, N.Y. Shelley served as a co-chair of the event, while Curran and Nugent served as presenters. Curran spoke on “Ethical Dilemmas for the Insurance Defense Lawyers Caused by the Tripartite Relationship and a Carrier’s Potential Recoupment of Defense Fees and Costs,” and Nugent discussed “What to Do When the Wheels Fall Off.”
A member in the Philadelphia office, Shelley is Chairman of the global insurance group and serves on the firm's Board of Directors and Management Committee. His practice primarily focuses on complex insurance coverage issues, including general and professional liability and bad faith matters.
Shelley serves as counsel for insurers in many major asbestos coverage cases as well as pending associated bankruptcy proceedings around the country. He also serves as national coordinating counsel for a major U.S. insurer on bad faith claims. He has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America since 2006.
Shelley is a graduate of Rutgers University – New Brunswick (B.A., with highest honors, 1976) and Rutgers University School of Law - Camden (J.D., 1979). He is admitted to practice in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York and before all of the federal district courts in each of those states, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court and the U.S. Courts of Appeal for the Second, Third and District of Columbia Circuits.
Curran concentrates her practice in the areas of bad faith insurance litigation, insurance coverage and agent and broker malpractice. She also has experience with construction defect and tort litigation. She represents and advises insurance companies in complex coverage and extra-contractual third and first party matters. She leads a highly motivated legal team specializing in representation of insurers and the defense of their insureds.
Admitted to practice in Texas and before the U.S. District Court for the Southern, Northern, Eastern and Western Districts of Texas and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, Curran is a member of the American Bar Association, the Dallas Bar Association’s Tort and Insurance and Construction Law sections, and the Defense Research Institute.
Curran earned her undergraduate degree from Texas Tech University (B.B.A., 1977), where she specialized in finance, her graduate degree from Southern Methodist University (M.B.A., 1978) and her law degree from Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law (J.D., 1982).
A member of the Chicago office and head of the enterprise risks practice, Nugent focuses her practice on containing transitional exposures, punitive damages and cyber-perils. She is also involved in developing specialty insurance and reinsurance solutions. She was also involved in the creation of one of the first insurance policies to cover technology risks and has successfully contained numerous technology claims involving a variety of issues, including patent infringement, theft of trade secrets, damage caused by software failures, data misuse and theft. Nugent is co-author of @ Risk: Internet and E-Commerce Insurance and Reinsurance Legal Issues. Nugent also has experience in punitive damages matters, having obtained favorable results in trial and appellate proceedings throughout the country, including notorious so-called “hell-hole” jurisdictions. She is co-author of Punitive Damages: A State-By-State Guide to Law and Practice.
Nugent has been recognized as an Illinois Super Lawyer and designated one of the Women to Watch by Business Insurance. She was also listed in A.M. Best’s People to Watch in the insurance industry for her punitive damages defense experience.
A resident of Barrington, Ill., Nugent earned her undergraduate degree from Knox College (B.A., with distinction and honors, 1984) and her law degree from Northwestern University School of Law (J.D., 1987). She is admitted to practice in before the U.S. Supreme Court, as well as the U.S. Courts of Appeal for the Seventh and Eighth Circuits, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and all Illinois state courts.