Opinion
M-82 (Ro).
March 5, 2007
OPINION and ORDER
Before me is petitioner's Petition to Disqualify Arbitrator, and respondent's Motion to Transfer.
Reliance Insurance Company ("Reliance") and Sureco National, LLC ("Sureco") had entered into a Program Manager's Agreement for Sureco to perform as the program manager for a particular automobile insurance program. Reliance, unhappy, filed a complaint in New Jersey District Court, which was stayed by consent pending the arbitration at issue here.
Under the Agreement, each party selects an arbitrator, and the two arbitrators appoint an umpire. The Agreement specifies the arbitrators' qualifications as "disinterested, impartial, active or retired officials within the insurance industry, with insurance experience."
Pet'r Pet. Disqualify Arb. Ex. A, Art. XVII(C), (E).
As an initial matter, this Court has diversity jurisdiction. In addition, the Agreement designates the District Court for the Southern District of New York as the forum for the parties to file an application "to appoint an umpire possessing the qualifications set forth above" and "for an order confirming the award." Finding jurisdiction to be proper, I deny respondent's motion to transfer this matter to the District of New Jersey, and turning to petitioner's application to disqualify respondent's choice of arbitrator, Joseph Buttafuoco, on the grounds that he is neither an active nor retired official within the insurance industry, and that his insurance industry experience is insufficient, from the facts before me, I cannot agree. Mr. Buttafuoco was in-house counsel for Allstate Insurance Company for 13 years, and for six of those years, he was "in upper management and held a position equivalent to that of an officer of the company at the Regional level." (Allstate did not use the term officer during his employment there.) Mr. Buttafuoco moved into private practice in 1970 to begin his own insurance defense practice, and has extensive experience advising legislators in New Jersey on insurance and tort reform. With these credentials totaling more than 40 years' experience, Mr. Buttafuoco is clearly an "active official within the insurance industry, with insurance experience."
Petitioner is a Pennsylvania corporation and the respondent is a New Jersey limited liability company; the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000.
While the Agreement does not mention a forum to settle the naming of an [adversaries'] arbitrator, the sense is there that the qualifying and naming of an appropriate fact-determiner put in issue by either side is placed in the hands of the Southern District of New York.
Resp't Mot. Transfer Ex. C, ¶ 5.
Resp't Mot. Transfer Ex. C, ¶ 6.
Accordingly, petitioner's Petition to Disqualify Arbitrator Buttafuoco is denied.
So Ordered.