A jury began deliberations Monday morning in a multibillion dollar suit over insurance coverage on the New York World Trade Center that will help determine how much money is available to rebuild the complex.
At issue is whether a dozen insurers led by Zurich-based Swiss Re agreed to an insurance form that defined the destruction of the Twin Towers on Sept. 11, 2001 as one event.
Lawyers for the leaseholder of the property, Larry Silverstein, have argued that since the towers were brought down by two different plane crashes, he should be able to collect double on his roughly $3.5 billion policy.
That money would be essential as Silverstein and New York Gov. George Pataki are attempting to lay a cornerstone this summer on plans to rebuild the complex.
The complex was destroyed just six weeks after Silverstein leased it, and he has been in an acrimonious battle with insurers ever since.
There may be as many as three trials to ultimately determine how much insurers owe, but this first one focuses on the narrow issue of whether 12 insurers signed onto a form of broker Willis Group Holdings Ltd. Prior court decisions have determined that under that form, the towers’ destruction was one event.
U.S. District Court Judge Michael Mukasey of the Southern District of New York instructed the jury Monday morning that the insurers had the burden of proof to show that a majority of the evidence pointed toward insurers signing to the Willis form. Mukasey said if the evidence was equal on both sides, they had to vote against the insurers.