In June of this year, Judge Tom Anderson joined the ranks of other judges in Tennessee that have held that punitive damages can be awarded against an insurance company for breach of an insurance contract, if the breach was intentional, malicious, reckless, or malicious.  The case was Carroll v. Nationwide Property & Casualty Company, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73674 (W.D. Tenn. June 8, 2015). This case confirms yet again that the 25% penalty afforded by the bad faith statute is not a policyholder’s sole and exclusive remedy for extra-contractual type damages for an insurance company’s bad behavior in handling and making a decision regarding an insurance claim.  The decision was a big win for my clients and Tennesseans as a whole.  For prior posts on this topic, click here and here.