Clark v. The Prudential Ins. Co. of America, No. 08-6197; U.S. District Court (DNJ); opinion by Debevoise, S.U.S.D.J.; filed April 18, 2013. DDS No. 23-7-xxxx [35 pp.]
This case concerns allegations of deception and bad faith against The Prudential Insurance Company of America. The heart of the complaint is that Prudential stopped selling Comprehensive Health Insurance policies to new customers (closing the block), knowing that this would result in prohibitive increases in premiums as sick policyholders remained in the block and healthy policyholders left, resulting in the sick getting locked into the increasingly expensive policy and locked out of alternative options due to pre-existing conditions. Plaintiff-former policyholders contend that Prudential falsely misrepresented to its policyholders that the only reason for increased premiums would be the increasing age of the insured and rising medical costs and failed to disclose that a major reason for the premium increases was the closing of the block. The court denied class certification on multiple grounds and granted Prudential’s summary judgment in part, based on the statute of limitations.
