Robert Badgley's practice includes commercial litigation and arbitration, as well as counseling clients on issues of insurance and reinsurance coverage. He is a member of the firm's Reinsurance Core Group.
Since 1991, Mr. Badgley has represented domestic and overseas insurers and reinsurers in numerous coverage disputes. He frequently renders coverage advice on large and complex liability and first-party property claims. Over the past decade, he has represented cedents and reinsurers in numerous multi-million dollar reinsurance lawsuits and arbitrations involving a wide range of claims (e.g., life & disability, XPL, first-party property, long-tail casualty, 9/11, Enron).
In October 2006, Mr. Badgley represented his reinsurer clients in a multi-million-dollar dispute. The arbitration panel denied the reinsurance claim and ordered the ceding insurer to pay the reinsurers' legal fees and arbitration costs.
In October 2008, his reinsurer clients won a $12 million arbitration featuring a dispute over XPL losses, and the panel ordered the ceding insurer to pay fees to Mr. Badgley's clients.
His court decisions include Ruthardt v. Lloyd’s (summary judgment on issue of “number of occurrences” in reinsurance treaties) and Owens Insurance Limited v. Transatlantic Re (summary judgment on issue whether facultative reinsurance contracts are “integrated” agreements).
Mr. Badgley has published various articles in the insurance and reinsurance industry. His article, “Follow-the-Allocations: Through Seven Provinces, Across the North River, and to the Gerling Wall,” appeared in the Winter 2005 edition of the Journal of Reinsurance. His article, "Reinsurance Arbitration: For Better or Worse," appeared in the April/May 2000 issue of the PLUS Journal.
Mr. Badgley also has given various public speeches in the insurance and reinsurance area. In February 2008, he spoke at Washington University Law School in St. Louis on mediator liability. In October 2006, he spoke about the arbitration process at a reinsurance conference in Miami. In June 2006, he addressed mediator liability issues to an ABA audience in Atlanta. In May 2002, he spoke in Chicago about emerging electronic risks at a reinsurance seminar sponsored by PLUS. In November 2001, he spoke in New York about recent legal developments at the Practicing Law Institute reinsurance conference. In December 2000, he gave a speech on the basics of reinsurance at a Chicago Bar Association luncheon.
Mr. Badgley also counsels and represents clients on Internet liability issues. He has represented several clients in ICANN “cyber arbitrations” involving domain name ownership disputes. He has been named by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) as one of WIPO’s panelists for domain name disputes, and has served as arbitrator in more than twenty-five such cases.
In 2001, Mr. Badgley published two law review articles on the subject of Internet domain name disputes. These articles appeared in University of Illinois Journal of Law, Technology & Policy and Texas Review of Law and Politics. In August 2001, he gave a speech in Chicago about Internet defamation and harassment issues at a Women in Insurance Networking Group seminar. In March 2002, he published a 700-page treatise, “Domain Name Disputes,” through Aspen Law & Business. The treatise has been cited authoritatively in more than ten ICANN domain name arbitration decisions.
Besides being a member of the Illinois bar admitted before the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, Mr. Badgley has argued and/or been admitted pro hac vice in federal courts in Wisconsin, Missouri (appellate) and Massachusetts (appellate), as well as state courts New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
Education
- J.D., University of Chicago Law School, 1991
- B.A., Political Science and French, summa cum laude, University of Illinois, 1988
Phi Beta Kappa
Bronze Tablet - Study Abroad, Université de Dijon, 1985
Bar Admissions
Admitted To Practice
- U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Languages