Titan Corp. v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co.

—Respondent the Titan Corporation (Titan) owned a plant in New Jersey (hereafter the Keasbey site or Keasbey facility) that had been operating since 1906. When Titan decided to close the plant in 1985, it began investigating the extent of its environmental cleanup responsibilities under a New Jersey statute. The investigation revealed the site had some forms of pollution.

Titan then purchased a policy of insurance from appellant Aetna Casualty and Surety Company (Aetna). The Aetna policy contained, among other provisions, a “pollution exclusion,” which, on first consideration, appears unambiguously to declare that the policy covered neither pollution damages nor cleanup liabilities. Titan nevertheless made a claim on the policy for the costs of cleaning up the Keasbey facility. Aetna denied the claim.

After trial the court below made factual and legal findings which had the net effect of declaring Aetna liable for part of the cleanup costs. On appeal, we are asked to review the policy and its exclusions, and to determine whether the evidence, viewed most favorably in support of the judgment, supports the conclusion the policy applied to the costs incurred by…