Keoghs’ has over 45 years’ experience defending latent legacy claims on behalf of insurers and employers, including a wide variety of self-insured companies, public bodies and commercial organisations.
We currently undertake latent legacy work for more than 10 insurers, including all of the top five major legacy insurers. The majority of these are long-standing relationships. Our strategic lead, David Pugh, has a broad depth of experience handling latent legacy cases.
The team has an enviable track record in successfully defending all types of disease claims – from more routine, low value cases through to high value, complex claims. We commonly deal with complex insurance, corporate history and apportionment issues.
We have substantial experience of coordinating our clients’ first response to a particular type of claim and have worked with many to help formulate their policy for floodgate scenarios involving, for example, NIHL, WRULD, HAVS and dermatitis claims.
We also offer real strategic support for insurers, through producing innovative ideas for test litigation where we advise clients on their legal merits and commercial value, bringing cases to a successful conclusion. Our team also add value through providing support and advice at policy level on legislative and procedural reform.
Our strategic team has considerable technical expertise. It has won three industry awards in recent years and is recommended by both Chambers & Partners and the Legal 500 for defendant personal injury work, with Chambers reporting that our strategic lead, David Pugh, is a lawyer who is "able to think outside the box in finding solutions".
David has successfully handled cases in the Court of Appeal, House of Lords and Supreme Court. He has advised a wide range of clients including major insurers, the ABI, the NHS and Government Departments. He is the current head of the FOIL Disease Sector Focus team, and has served on the Court of Appeal Users Committee. He was named Defendant Lawyer of the Year in 2013 and was shortlisted in 2008. Notable cases include Rothwell v Chemical Insulations - the pleural plaques decision which saved insurers an estimated £1.4 billion. He acted for the ABI in their Supreme Court intervention in Zurich v IEG. He advised major insurers on the successful Supreme Court challenge to the Recovery of Medical Costs for Asbestos Diseases (Wales) Bill. He advised the ABI and major insurers on the Mesothelioma Act and 2013 Mesothelioma Consultation. He has further successful Court of Appeal decisions on stress at work and European Convention issues.
Joining Keoghs’ Coventry office in 2010, Katie’s technical ability, understanding of, and aptitude for, strategic litigation meant she was quickly assisting David Pugh. Appointed Associate in 2012, and partner in 2015, she has not only led a litigated deafness team for a major insurer, but also developed and grew Keoghs’ own niche strategic disease department - one of the only such teams in the market. Promoted to Deputy Technical Director in 2014, Katie was named Young Achiever of the Year at the 2014 Personal Injury Awards. Katie has been the main technical support or our disease team in Coventry for the past five years and as well as providing technical training and guidance to both pre-proceedings and litigated teams, her role in strategic litigation has increased considerably, to the extent she is regularly asked to scope and prepare ideas for test litigation by clients. As such she has taken a joint lead role with David Pugh in various on-going test litigation projects with estimated values in the tens of millions. The strategic projects Katie has been involved in are related to the area of latent asbestos liabilities, potential future respiratory disease and insurance-focused issues. With a specialism in stress-related and psychiatric injury cases, Katie has grown a client base following a number of successfully defended cases, for both insurers and commercial business. Katie also assists clients in developing best practice guides and provides in-house training on specialist issues.
Ryan is a solicitor and lead fee earner within the disease team. He has been working on claims outsourced under the Government Procurement Services (GPS) since he qualified as a solicitor in 2012. He joined Keoghs as a trainee solicitor in 2010. Since qualifying, Ryan has worked closely with Katie Rose as her assistant, whilst managing his own case load of noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) claims he has also developed his own expertise in handling asbestos related conditions. Ryan now manages his own case load of mesothelioma and other asbestos related conditions plus NIHL claims both pre and post proceedings. He has also played an integral part on the strategic projects.
Eleanor completed her training contract with Keoghs and qualified as a solicitor on 1st March 2016. She assists Katie Rose and David Pugh on strategic projects and group litigation as well as running her own case load of multi-track mesothelioma and other disease cases.
Joining Keoghs’ Coventry office in 2011 as a trainee solicitor, Ali has quickly progressed at Keoghs qualifying as an assistant solicitor in 2013 and recently appointed as an Associate. Ali has led a litigated deafness team for a major insurer and also undertook a successful secondment with another. Ali has been involved in a number of significant high profile projects including successfully coordinating the response on behalf of 14 different firms in a consolidated action of 80 claims against Isaac Abrahams Solicitors. Ali’s ability to co-ordinate large numbers of defendants and insurers in the action has been praised by both the judiciary and insurers and led to the SRA intervention against Isaac Abrahams.
The service you deliver is integral to the success of your business. With the right technology, we can help you to heighten your customer experience, improve underwriting performance, and streamline processes.