On Monday, May 12, Centauri Specialty Insurance Holdings, and Centauri Specialty Managers (CSM) were granted expedited discovery in a lawsuit against Wellington Insurance Group for breach of contract and related violations.

Applied Underwriters, Inc. had recently acquired Centauri Specialty Insurance Holdings, and during that acquisition, some Centauri employees left the company to work at Wellington Insurance Group.

The initial lawsuit, filed on May 1 in Sarasota County, Florida, alleges that Wellington Insurance of Texas breached a confidentiality agreement and nonsolicitation provisions that were agreed upon by both parties during negotiations for the acquisition of Centauri. Jeffrey Silver, the Executive VP and General Counsel of Applied, commented: "We are holding that a civil conspiracy existed between the defendants to use Centauri's confidential information to gain an unfair competitive advantage."