Federal Appellate Court Rejects Bad-Faith Claims-Handling Action by Military Contractors

A federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit by a group of civilian workers who were injured while serving as military contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq over the alleged bad-faith handling of their claims for benefits under the Defense Base Act. The 32 plaintiffs say they represent the interests of some 10,000 similarly situated workers. They had been asking for over $2 billion in damages from their former employers, and the carriers for their employers, for conspiring to delay or deny them the benefits they were due. However, a panel of the District of Columbia Cir...