Couple says life insurance policy is ripping them off

CHARLESTON - A couple is charging The Equitable Life Insurance Company with misrepresenting the terms of a life insurance policy that they say has cost them over $1 million.

Albert and Delores Summers filed the lawsuit May 15 in Kanawha Circuit Court and also list AXA Advisors and agent Robert Hurley as defendants.

"To date, Plaintiffs have paid over $1 million in premiums into the policy," the complaint says. "Plaintiffs have had to decrease the face value of the policy while paying increased premiums in order to keep the policy in force.

"Plaintiff (Albert) Summers is now virtually uninsurable and all Plaintiffs have been the victim of the defendants' wrongdoing."

Summers said he agreed to a $3.2 million life insurance policy on Sept. 17, 1986, but a copy of it was not left with him.

He says he was not informed how the policy's premiums would be managed.

"It was not disclosed in writing nor verbally how the company's manipulation and method for determining the interest cold affect Plaintiffs' policy with regard to the cash value or the viability of the policy through the maturity date," the complaint says.

He adds that the benefits and advantages of the policy were also misrepresented.

The defendants are charged with: Breach of fiduciary duty; misrepresentation; suppression and/or omission of material facts; negligence; wantonness; negligent or wanton hiring, training and/or supervision; unjust enrichment; unfair and deceptive acts or practices; and breach of contract.

Rodney Miller of McCallum, Methvin and Terrell in Birmingham, Ala., is the plaintiffs' attorney. They are seeking compensatory and punitive damages.

Judge Louis Bloom has been assigned the case.

Kanawha Circuit Court case number 06-C-917