Raymond T. DeMeo

Counsel

  • Overview

    Biography

    Ray DeMeo handles insurance litigation, including claims stemming from large-scale natural and man-made disasters. He has extensive experience with complex and high-exposure property and general liability insurance claims and litigation, including class action lawsuits, domestically and internationally. He is a member of the firm's Insurance + Reinsurance Group.

    Property Insurance Coverage Litigation

    Ray has extensive experience as a property insurance litigator, both inside and outside the companies he represents. Before he joined Robinson+Cole, he was Assistant Vice President and Managing Counsel at Travelers Property Casualty Company, where he oversaw all commercial property insurance litigation nationwide, including bad faith lawsuits arising from property insurance claims. He directly supervised the World Trade Center property insurance litigation and oversaw all litigation arising from Hurricane Katrina. Ray also served as Assistant Vice President of Property Claims at Ironshore Specialty Insurance Company, where he supervised high-exposure surplus lines property claims and litigation, nationally and internationally, and assisted in the drafting of specialty policy forms and endorsements.

    Ray has tried several cases to verdict in federal and state courts, and has briefed and argued numerous state and federal court appeals. He is a court-appointed arbitrator and special master for the Connecticut Judicial Department.

    Pro Bono

    Ray is involved in the firm’s effort to help immigrant children who are abandoned, abused, or neglected. The program involves assisting children who are seeking Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS), so they can avoid deportation and eventually become United States citizens.

    Ray is also an adjunct professor of insurance law at the University of Connecticut School of Law, where he teaches a course in Property Insurance Law. He is the former President of the Federal Bar Association of Hartford County. Ray is a frequent speaker at professional conferences sponsored by the American Bar Association’s Tort and Insurance Practice Section, the Defense Research Institute, the Loss Executives Association, and other industry groups. He served as a law clerk to the Honorable Ellen Ash Peters during her tenure as Chief Justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court.

    Ray regularly writes on insurance-related topics and contributes to the firm’s blog, Property Insurance Coverage Insights

  • Experience
    • Experience

      Experience

      • Obtained summary judgment in favor of an insurance company client in a suit by a hospital for losses it sustained after it inadvertently used surgical instruments that had been exposed to a highly contagious communicable disease on hospital patients. The hospital made a claim under the policy's coverage for communicable disease and crisis management. The District Court agreed with the carrier that these coverage's only applied to premises contamination, not loss to patients or loss of the instruments themselves.

      • Won summary judgment on behalf of an insurance company client in federal court, defeating plaintiff’s allegations of breach of contract, bad faith and statutory violations. The owner of a hotel had sought to recover for the total loss of the business due to a 2011 tornado in Massachusetts followed by rain and ice storms later that year. The court agreed with the insurer that the insured’s failure to repair or replace the property within two years of the date of loss, as required by the insurance contract, meant there was no coverage for replacement cost, rejecting the insured's&#’; summary judgment on behalf of an insurance company client in federal court, defeating plaintiff’s allegations of breach of contract, bad faith and statutory violations. The owner of a hotel had sought to recover for the total loss of the business due to a 2011 tornado in Massachusetts followed by rain and ice storms later that year. The court agreed with the insurer that the insured’s failure to repair or replace the property within two years of the date of loss, as required by the insurance contract, meant there was no coverage for replacement cost, rejecting the insureds&#’; summary judgment on behalf of an insurance company client in federal court, defeating plaintiff’s allegations of breach of contract, bad faith and statutory violations. The owner of a hotel had sought to recover for the total loss of the business due to a 2011 tornado in Massachusetts followed by rain and ice storms later that year. The court agreed with the insurer that the insured’s failure to repair or replace the property within two years of the date of loss, as required by the insurance contract, meant there was no coverage for replacement cost, rejecting the insureds&#’; summary judgment on behalf of an insurance company client in federal court, defeating plaintiff’s allegations of breach of contract, bad faith and statutory violations. The owner of a hotel had sought to recover for the total loss of the business due to a 2011 tornado in Massachusetts followed by rain and ice storms later that year. The court agreed with the insurer that the insured’s failure to repair or replace the property within two years of the date of loss, as required by the insurance contract, meant there was no coverage for replacement cost, rejecting the insureds’ argument that delays in claim resolution were the carrier's fault, and should extend the two-year period.

      • Won summary judgment for an insurer who argued that the progressive deterioration and cracking of foundation walls caused by oxidation of minerals in the concrete was not a “sudden and accidental” collapse, as required by the insurer’s policy.

      • Obtained summary judgment in litigation involving a claim for $1.5 million in goods damaged in a flooded warehouse due to Hurricane Sandy. Court held that flood exclusion was not limited to flood caused by earth movement.

      • Successfully represented insurer in combined appeals to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit involving claims of alleged “collapse” of defective concrete foundations.

    • Professional Associations

      Professional Associations

      American Bar Association

      Connecticut Bar Association

      Loss Executives Association

      University of Connecticut School of Law
      Adjunct Professor
  • NEWS + PRESS
    • Presentations

      Presentations

      "Business Interruption and First-Party Coverage After Hurricanes, Floods: Issues for Insurers and Insureds," presented as a Strafford CLE webinar (12/7/2021)
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      "Crumbling Concrete: Anatomy of a Progressive Loss," (6/3/2021)
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      "Business Interruption Insurance Coverage and the COVID-19 Crisis: An Examination," co-presented with Gregory P. Varga, Gerald P. Dwyer Jr. and Wystan M. Ackerman, the first in a series of webinars designed to explore critical coverage and loss measurement issues that are expected to emerge from COVID-19-related business interruption claims. (3/26/2020)
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      "The ALI's Restatement of the Law of Liability Insurance, The World Turned Upside Down?" (April 29, 2019)
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      "The World Turned Upside Down," co-presented with J. Tyler Butts, in Hartford, Connecticut (4/5/2019)
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      "Policy Inconsistencies, Inter-Insurer Conflicts, and Effective Claim Handling in the Market Situation," facilitator at the 87th Annual Meeting & Educational Conference of the Loss Executives Association in St. Petersburg, Florida (1/24/2018)
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      "Developing & Recurring Issues In Property Insurance," co-presented with J. Tyler Butts and Daniel F. Sullivan, at in-house client presentation to 30 adjusters and claim managers (6/29/2016)

    • News

      R+C in the News

      • April 11, 2019

        J. Tyler Butts and Ray DeMeo Take Part in ALI’s Restatement of Law Liability Insurance Conference

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      • February 26, 2018

        Ray DeMeo Presents at the Loss Executives Association Annual Meeting

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      R+C News Releases

      • July 17, 2014

        Robinson+Cole Welcomes Six New Lawyers

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