Latest Florida Headlines

All the headlines from our Florida Topic Page, ordered by recency.

Keyes Acquires Three Florida Firms

Mar 3 2023 // Keyes Coverage, a rapidly growing Florida insurance brokerage, has acquired three firms: Bill and Sheila Gaylor Insurance, based in Melbourne, Florida; My Florida Insurance Broker, in Vero Beach; and Brian Laudanno...

Florida’s Reform Bill Means New Deadlines for Insurers, Insureds, Starting This Week

Mar 3 2023 // Senate Bill 2A, enacted into law in December, gave Florida property insurers some major relief on litigation costs. But it also required a number of consumer-friendly actions from carriers and sets new timetables on...

Florida Injury Attorney Who Used LOPs Charged With Stealing $850,000 from Clients

Mar 2 2023 // A Tampa-area personal injury attorney, once active in auto accident, rideshare and other insurance claims litigation, has been arrested and charged with multiple counts of money laundering and grand theft.The Pinellas...

Florida’s SB 2A Ended One-Way Legal Fees. Now Some Insurers Say it’s Retroactive

Mar 1 2023 // Plaintiffs’ attorneys took it on the chin when Florida lawmakers in December approved Senate Bill 2A, which ended the practice of one-way attorney fees in property insurance litigation.Now, though, a number of...

Florida Speaker Says Tort-Reform Bill May See Changes Before It’s Approved

Feb 28 2023 // A Florida tort-reform bill that picks up where previous insurance-market rescue bills left off has passed its first milestone and now moves to the full House Judiciary Committee. But the speaker of the House said the...

Florida Nursing Home Operator Acquitted of Causing Patient Deaths in Hurricane Irma

Feb 27 2023 // A judge on Friday acquitted a Florida nursing home administrator accused of causing the overheating deaths of nine patients after Hurricane Irma in 2017, saying that his employees had provided care and prosecutors had not...

Florida’s Universal Insurance Bounces Back in Q4 After Hurricane Ian Losses

Feb 27 2023 // Universal Insurance Holdings Inc. (UVE), parent company of Universal Property & Casualty Insurance Co., last week reported net income of $25.1 million in its fourth quarter, a sharp increase from the previous...

Florida City’s Insurance to Pay $2 million in Settlement in Fatal Police Shooting

Feb 27 2023 // A South Florida city has reached a $2 million settlement with the family of a Black motorist who was fatally shot by a police officer after his vehicle broke down on an interstate off-ramp more than seven years ago.The...

Florida TV News Crews Reeling After Reporter, 2 Others Gunned Down in Orlando

Feb 24 2023 // A Florida television station identified Thursday a 24-year-old reporter who was fatally shot while covering a shooting death in an Orlando area neighborhood, as well as its photojournalist who was critically injured in the...

Florida’s Notice-of-Intent Trips Up Medicare Recovery Firm in Suits Versus Insurers

Feb 24 2023 // A law firm that has made a multibillion-dollar business out of suing auto and liability insurers for Medicare reimbursement payments may have met its match in Florida’s notice-of-intent-to-sue requirements.A panel of...

SterlingRisk Acquires Worldwide Insurance in Florida

Feb 23 2023 // New York-based SterlingRisk, a privately held insurance broker, has acquired Worldwide Insurance Group, headquartered in Coral Gables, Florida. Ruidiaz Worldwide’s founder and president, Anthony Ruidiaz, will become...

Florida Art Dealer Pleads Guilty in Warhol Forgery Scheme

Feb 23 2023 // A South Florida art dealer pleaded guilty in federal court Tuesday in connection with a scheme involving the sale of fake Andy Warhol paintings.Daniel Elie Bouaziz, 69, pleaded to a single count of money laundering in Fort...

Florida Home Fire and Welding Site Explosion Kill Five People

Feb 22 2023 // Two people were killed and three others injured Tuesday when at least two tractor-trailers exploded at a truck and welding business in Miami.The Miami Herald and local TV news outlets reported that the explosion and fire...

Florida Workers’ Comp Revises Wording on Payment to Surgical Centers

Feb 22 2023 // The Florida Division of Workers’ Compensation has made a tweak to its proposed reimbursement manual for ambulatory surgical centers.The change, posted after a Jan. 12 hearing on the issue, would clarify the wording...

Neighbors Recoil at Florida Pool Shaped Like Gun

Feb 21 2023 // The swimming pool in the backyard of Louis Minardi’s home may be distinctive to Florida: The custom-built pool is shaped like a six-shooter revolver, in a state made famous – sometimes infamous – by guns,...

Orderly Runoff Didn’t Work; Florida’s United P&C Now Insolvent, Headed for Liquidation

Feb 20 2023 // Just days after some 90,000 policies from troubled United Property & Casualty Insurance Co. were transferred to Slide Insurance as part of a wind-down of the carrier, it was announced that UPC is officially broke and...

Trial Lawyers Push Back Against Florida Plan for More Insurance Tort Reform

Feb 15 2023 // It’s now clear what the regular session of the Florida Legislature will focus on when lawmakers convene March 7: More litigation measures that would bring property insurance-type reforms to automobile, liability and...

Florida Citrus, Hit by Storms and Fungus, Now Faces a Butterfly from the Caribbean

Feb 13 2023 // The lime swallowtail butterfly — an invasive species that hails from Asia and which has damaged citrus trees throughout the Caribbean for nearly 20 years — has now reached Florida.The Papilio demoleus Linnaeus...

Governor Names Yaworsky New Florida Insurance Commissioner

Feb 13 2023 // Florida’s governor has named the insurance department’s former chief of staff as new insurance commissioner, filling a position that has been vacant since the former commissioner resigned in late...

Hilb Buys Nowell in Mississippi, Alkeme Acquires PEO Exchange in Florida

Feb 10 2023 // Hilb Group Buys Nowell Agency in MississippiThe Hilb Group has expanded into Mississippi with the acquisition of The Nowell Agency, the property insurance brokerage and benefits firm announced. The Nowell Agency has...