In 2020, NRRA Successfully Pursued Its Effective Amicus Curiae Strategy

NRRA’s amicus curiae (a Latin term meaning “friend of the court”) strategy over the past nine years has transformed the legal landscape for RRGs in the nation’s courts.
Through that strategy, we’ve educated and convinced state supreme and appellate courts, as well as federal circuit courts of appeal, about the fundamental proposition that the LRRA preempts all state laws attempting to regulate RRGs’ business of insurance.

In March of this year, we prevailed in the case of Allied Professionals Insurance Company RRG vs. Anglesey, with a resoundingly positive decision before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. (A couple of years earlier, we achieved a similar decision in the case of Attorneys Liab. Prot. Soc’y, Inc. v. Ingaldson Fitzgerald (ALPS), also before the 9th Circuit Court.)
More recently, in the case of Benson vs. Casa de Capri Enterprises LLC, Continuing Care Risk Retention Group, Inc., NRRA again filed an amicus curiae brief. That case went to oral argument before the 9th Circuit on Oct. 5 and has now been remanded back to the Arizona Supreme Court.

Since then, NRRA has filed amicus curiae briefs with the United States Bankruptcy Court in the Northern District of New York on a similar issue regarding the LRRA preemption.

Significantly, after we prevailed in the Angelsey case before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, the plaintiff filed a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari before the United States Supreme Court. NRRA responded with an extensive briefing encouraging the Supreme Court to take the case and settle the issue by deciding that state laws prohibiting arbitration clauses in insurance contracts are categorically preempted for risk retention groups.

While the Supreme Court, predictably, did not accept certiorari — it accepts less than 1% of such petitions — its actions underscored the proposition that it saw no need to reverse our 9th Circuit victory in the case. It was also a first that a “LRRA preemption” case has seen the inside of the nation’s highest court.