WML Gryphon Fund, LLC, et al., v. Wood, Hat & Silver, LLC, et al.

Analysis Group was retained by Phoenix Life Insurance Company and Transamerica Life Insurance Company, defendants in an insurance dispute brought by WML Gryphon Fund LLC, its various funds, and its investors. The plaintiffs invested in funds that lent money to fund life insurance premiums and obtained ownership interests in those policies if the loans were not repaid. The plaintiffs then resold those policies on the secondary market for life insurance, called the life settlement market.

Plaintiffs claimed that a few years after they invested, the defendants conspired to no longer honor these types of policies. As a result, plaintiffs claimed they could not recover their investments because life settlement buyers would no longer purchase the policies.

An Analysis Group team, led by Managing Principals Mark Gustafson and Ted Davis, supported academic affiliate Daniel Bauer, who filed an expert report and testified at deposition. Professor Bauer opined on the reasons for a decline in the life settlement market that may have affected the value of the at-issue policies, and he also rebutted calculations of the plaintiffs’ damages expert.

A judge in the State of Wisconsin Circuit Court included citations to Professor Bauer’s testimony in granting summary judgment for the defendants and dismissing the plaintiffs’ claims.