What is in the D&O Tracker dataset?
The D&O Tracker contains data on D&O insurance coverage cases identified through (a) boolean searches in Lex Machina, (b) boolean and natural language searches in Lexis and Westlaw, and (c) manual review of the D&O Diary blog, current legal news sources, multiple law firm websites, and the TIPS annual report of D&O litigation.
To be included in the Tracker dataset the case must involve true D&O insurance coverage issues. Thus, the dataset does not include cases involving Employment Practices Liability Insurance or other kinds of insurance coverage that may be sold as a package with D&O insurance coverage.
The data collected for each coverage case include policyholder name and industry code; insurer name, group, and AM Best number; the Nature of Suit code for the underlying litigation (for state cases we manually code the case using the federal NOS codes); policyholder and insurer law firms; the court in which the case is litigated; the type of D&O insurance policy and state of issue; the relevant insurance policy forms; the D&O coverage issues in dispute, and information regarding key litigation events, together with the coverage issues addressed in each event.
Thanks to Lex Machina, the D&O Tracker dataset contains what is believed to be close to a complete set of federal cases that were active in trial court as of 2009 or later. The dataset also includes earlier federal cases that we identified using other methods, but we are certain that there are many more earlier cases that never left adequately discernible traces. The state cases in the database include cases identified through boolean searches in the Lex Machina state court database, as well as cases identified using other methods.
Once we identified the cases, the team started coding the currently active federal court and Delaware and New York state court cases and working backwards in time. We have completed the coding of all the relevant cases filed since January 1, 2020 in those jurisdictions. We are in the process of coding cases filed in additional state courts and will add those cases as we complete a jurisdiction. We will also continue working backward in time in federal and state cases, prioritizing cases that relate to the cases in the Stanford Securities Litigation Analytics database.
What’s displayed on this website?
This website displays some of the data from only a subset of the cases in the dataset. At present that subset includes only federal, New York, and Delaware cases that are ongoing or that were filed after December 31, 2019.
If you are aware of a case that meets the criteria for display and that is not displayed, please let us know by sending an email to CCLT@law.upenn.edu. Please include the case name, court, and docket number, a copy of the complaint, and a copy of the insurance policy(ies) at issue.
Just how current is the data on the D&O Tracker website?
We identify federal cases and some state cases using Lex Machina’s amazing legal analytics for insurance litigation platform. They generally pick up cases within a few hours of filing, but our coding process runs a couple weeks behind that. We also identify cases from current news sources such as BloombergLaw and Law360.
How can I help the D&O Tracker project?
- Tell us about cases we’re missing: The D&O Tracker contains data on D&O insurance coverage cases identified through (a) Boolean searches in Lex Machina, (b) Boolean and natural language searches in Lexis and Westlaw, and (c) manual review of the D&O Diary blog, current legal news sources, multiple law firm websites, and the TIPS annual report of D&O litigation. We know that this system is imperfect. So we need you to tell us about cases we are missing.
- Tell us about data that seems incorrect. The Tracker is manually coded. People make mistakes. Tell us about the ones that you find.
- Tell us what aspects of D&O litigation we should be tracking.
- Tell us how you would use our data if you had access to all of it.
- For all these and anything else email us at CCLT@law.upenn.edu.
Who is coding the cases in the D&O Tracker dataset?
University of Pennsylvania and University of Connecticut law students trained by Professor Tom Baker are coding the cases. The D&O Tracker team (past and present) includes Gordon Bogardus, Dominika Borek, Owen Curran, Meghan Diamond, Claire Fitzgibbons, Grace Brunner, Jessie Hess, Andrew Higgins, Gianni Hill, Dylan Kirton, Timothy Ku, Samual Mahler, William McCarter, Rosario Naranja-Zarate, Yuan Pan, Eleni Pappas, Vijay Prakash, and Yu Miao.
