MARINE SPECIALTY MANAGEMENT ORDERED TO PAY REST OF CLAIM

Arizona-based managing general agency Marine Specialty Management has been ordered by a Federal Court in North Carolina to pay the remaining $40,000 of a $100,000 claim resulting from the deaths of two women who were parasailing in Ocean Isle Beach, NC in 2009. The boat was operated by Ocean Isle Beach Watersports and NC Watersports. Marine Specialty Management's president is Craig Reynolds, who, along with Charles O'Hara and Bruce Woods, plus International Marine Underwriters Limited (IMU) (no link to the One Beacon subsidiary of the same name), International Wet Marine Underwriters (IWMU), Marine Specialty Management and Commercial Water Sports Operator's Association, was handed a Cease & Desist Order in 2001 by the California Department of Insurance. At the time IMU and IWMU, which underwrote the California policies, failed to appear on the list of Eligible Surplus Lines insurers. The CDI said that Craig Reynolds and Charles O'Hara formed IMU and IWMU in the mid-1990s, with a base in St Vincent. The California Department claimed in 2001 that premiums quoted by Marine Specialty Management were typically 40% to 60% lower than the standard market rate for an authorized carrier writing a similar policy. A similar order was given in Idaho on October 15 2001. Marine Specialty Management was also handed a cease and desist order in Washington state in 2004, while IWMU, MUL and MSM were fined $20,000 in Texas in September 2005 for undertaking unauthorized insurance. In 2004 it was found that Marine Specialty Management was licensed in Arizona, but not for surplus lines.