Hunton Andrews Kurth Continues Expansion of National Coverage Practice with Insurance Recovery Attorney Lara Degenhart Cassidy

Lara Degenhart Cassidy, an insurance coverage attorney with nearly three decades of experience representing corporate policyholders and individuals in complex coverage disputes has joined Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP as a Special Counsel in Washington, D.C.

Cassidy assists clients in the energy, chemical, retail, technology, construction, political law, financial services and entertainment industries pursue coverage in a wide range of underlying disputes, including class action securities litigation, shareholder derivative suits, regulatory and administrative proceedings, general liability claims, professional liability claims, wrongful death and food recall claims. 

She joins the firm from Perkins Coie LLP and is the most recent addition to Hunton Andrews Kurth’s insurance coverage practice, which has added eight attorneys over the past year. Her new colleagues include partner Koorosh Talieh in Washington and special counsel Scott DeVries in San Francisco, who joined the firm in December and May, respectively, and Andrea DeField in Miami, who was promoted to partner on April 1.

“Lara is an outstanding attorney whose experience and reputation as a trial lawyer and counselor add further depth to our nationally recognized policyholder practice, as we continue to build one of the largest national platforms,” said Walter Andrews, head of Hunton Andrews Kurth’s insurance coverage practice. “Several of our partners have known Lara for many years and we are thrilled to welcome her to the firm.”

Cassidy’s experience includes seeking coverage for companies and their individual directors, officers, and managers under Directors & Officers (D&O) or Management Liability insurance policies. She notably led the appellate briefing in MBIA Inc. v. Federal Insurance Co., which led to a groundbreaking Second Circuit decision on D&O insurance coverage issues, resulting in full coverage for her financial-services client.

Some of her past representations include:

• Negotiating full-policy-limits funding by a D&O tower of the settlement of significant shareholder liability claims against a major coal producing company alleging that corporate mismanagement led to tragic loss of life and undervalued the company in a subsequent merger.
• Recovering the costs that a leading oil field services company incurred to assess, mitigate and resolve regulatory proceedings, private securities litigation, shareholder derivative claims, and internal and external corporate investigations arising from the company’s restatement of its earnings.
• Representing a major coal company and its subsidiaries in a complex series of mediations, litigations, arbitrations, and administrative actions to recover insurance proceeds under fifty years of general liability insurance policies for thousands of bodily injury and property damage claims from both solvent and insolvent insurers.    

Cassidy earned her undergraduate degree at Southwestern University and her law degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law.

Hunton Andrews Kurth’s insurance coverage practice has decades of experience helping clients maximize insurance recoveries through insurance program reviews, claims presentation and negotiation, litigation, alternate dispute resolution, trials and appeals. With offices in Washington, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Atlanta, Dallas, London and other key commercial centers, the team has advised policyholders with traditional and emerging insurance products in virtually every sector of the economy, including financial services, utilities, energy, natural resources, health care, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, consumer products, telecommunications, technology, e-commerce, manufacturing and more.