DeHeng Successfully Represented a Property Insurance Company in a Dispute over Liability for Damages Caused by Property Preservation
2023-04-06
Recently, in relation to a dispute between a real estate company and a client surnamed Mou and a property insurance company over the liability for damages caused by property preservation, DeHeng represented the property insurance company and received a civil ruling from the Guizhou Provincial Higher People's Court of second instance, which rejected all the litigation claims of the real estate company, successfully reducing the loss of the property insurance company by more than RMB 50 million.
In the basic case, the actual constructor, Mou, applied to the Liupanshui Intermediate People's Court on the grounds of a dispute over the construction contract, demanding the real estate company to pay a total of about RMB 110 million in principal and interest for the project, and also applied for the preservation of the bank deposits, real estate and other properties of the real estate company. At the same time Mou purchased the litigation property preservation liability insurance from a property insurance company. After the first and second instances, the effective judgment of the basic case ruled that the real estate company did not bear any legal responsibility, and the court of first instance ruled to lift all property preservation measures taken against the real estate company. Subsequently, the real estate company applied to the Liupanshui Intermediate People's Court for compensation of more than RMB 50 million caused by the property preservation measures taken in the basic case on the grounds of dispute over the liability for damages caused by property preservation, and the property insurance company should be jointly and severally liable for the aforementioned civil liability for providing litigation property preservation liability insurance to Mou.
After receiving the mandate from the property insurance company, the DeHeng team, with primary support of lawyers Jia Hui, Fang Fang and Wu Wenbo of Beijing Office, and lawyers Yang Qian and Ye Tianzhi of Guiyang Office, represented the case, and sorted and analyzed in detail the main facts and dispute points of the case with the legal department of the head office of the property insurance company, the legal department of its provincial company and branches. After the unremitting efforts and meticulous preparation of DeHeng lawyers, the Liupanshui Intermediate People's Court rejected all the litigation claims of the real estate company in the first instance, and the Guizhou Provincial Higher People's Court of the second instance ruled that the appeal was automatically withdrawn because the real estate company failed to pay the appeal fee on time.
This case faced many challenges due to the large financial amount involved, the complexity of the legal relationship, the difficulty of obtaining evidence, and the impact of the COVID-19 protocols. Relying on the linkage and cooperation mechanism between the Beijing Office and the Guiyang office, DeHeng lawyers overcame many difficulties, comprehensively and deeply analyzed various possibilities in the trial process of the case through extensive and in-depth academic research, case search, and moot court. They applied to the court for investigation and evidence collection during the litigation process to find out the status of the seized property during the seizure period, analyzed and sorted evidence by category, wrote agency opinions and selected eight similar cases heard by the Supreme People's Court in the past three years to present to the court. In the end, the court rejected the claim of the real estate company that Mou's seizure had caused losses to it, and dismissed all its claims.
