A few months ago, New York Civil Law posted about the New York Court of Appeals case Lang v. Hanover Ins. Co., which  held that Section 3420 of the Insurance Law
requires the plaintiff to secure a judgment over the underlying
tortfeasor before the plaintiff can  commence an action against the tortfeasor’s insurer (see prior post).   New York County Supreme Court Justice Edmead in Griffin v. Assicuriazioni Generali recently applied the Court’s holding in Lang retroactively.

Because the Lang decision interpreted a statute, it appears that Justice Edmead arrived at the correct conclusion that the decision applied retroactively.  However, we’ll have to see how the issue plays out on appeal and in other cases.