Rulings on what constitutes an
“occurrence” can dismay both insurers and policyholders
Mass shootings are traumatic enough. It’s even more concerning
to think that adequate compensation may depend on t
he structure of coverage and whether a court thinks a policy provision is ambiguous.
By Joseph S. Harrington, CPCU
The same basic claim arising from the same tragic event—or was it events?—has produced two similar rulings from two different courts in the same state. Yet the impact of each ruling is different and each has implications for the definition of an “occurrence” for liability insurance coverage.
Readers will recall the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in February 2018. Seventeen students were killed and another 17 wounded. In addition to criminal prosecution, some 60 civil suits were filed alleging negligence on the part of the school board, sheriff’s department, and other persons and entities.
A single occurrence
In response to suits against the Broward County school board, its third-party insurance administrator (TPA) stated that “this unfortunate and tragic incident … is being handled as a multi-party claim under one occurrence.” That meant that total compensation for all victims would amount to $300,000, the school board’s aggregate limit under the state’s state sovereign immunity law for local governments.
The claimants challenged the TPA assertion, arguing that each shot should be treated as a separate occurrence, each compensable under its own $200,000 per-occurrence limit. Their case made it to the Florida Supreme Court, which ruled in September 2020 that the tragedy was indeed a single continuous incident subject to the $300,000 aggregate limit.[1]
The Parkland plaintiffs may have expected better from the Florida Supreme Court, since it had found in 2003 that separate gunshots on a private location constituted separate occurrences, each triggering the per-occurrence limit.[2] (The total amount of coverage in that case was subject to an annual aggregate limit.)
Despite its court victory, the Broward Country school board later entered into a $25 million settlement with Parkland victims’ families.
Multiple occurrences
Next up was the Broward County sheriff’s department, whose excess liability insurer flipped the script by claiming each shot fired constituted a separate occurrence, thus triggering a $500,000 self-insured retention and a $500,000 per-occurrence deductible for each shot.[3]
The self-insured retention (SIR) was the most onerous requirement; failure to meet the SIR would eliminate any insurance coverage for an occurrence. The deductible, on the other hand, would reduce but not eliminate the amount paid for an occurrence.[4]
The sheriff’s department sued the insurer, claiming the entire event was a single occurrence with one deductible. The sheriff’s department prevailed in a U.S. appeals court, which ruled in November 2025 that the policy’s definition of “occurrence” was ambiguous, and thus should be interpreted in favor of the insured.
More or less compensation
Insurance law and sovereign immunity are not the same thing, but two similar rulings—one for the insurer and one against the insurer—will leave observers baffled and irritated, especially since both rulings could have left victims with less of a source of recovery than they hoped.
That’s easy to see in the ruling that limited the school board’s insurance liability to $300,000. In the case of the sheriff’s department, its legal victory effectively capped its own payout to $1 million (the $500,000 SIR and $500,000 per-occurrence deductible.) If the department had access to resources to meet multiple deductibles and SIRs, its insurance limit would remain unaffected and could have paid in addition to the sheriff’s department payouts.
The Florida rulings in the Parkland case contrast with a 2024 ruling in a Michigan case arising from the November 2021 mass shooting at Oxford High School where four students were killed and others wounded.
In response to civil suits filed against the Oxford school district, the risk pool insuring the district sought to define the event as a single occurrence subject to a single $5 million limit. The district sued, claiming, among other things, that since the state had made a criminal charge for each victim, the interpretation of “occurrence” for liability insurance purposes should allow for at least the same number of occurrences.
The school district prevailed in state district court, establishing the amount of compensation available to be at least $55 million.
Mass shootings are traumatic enough. It’s even more concerning to think that that adequate compensation may depend on the structure of coverage and whether a court thinks a policy provision is ambiguous.
[1] Barnett v. Department of Financial Services, 305 So. 3d 523 (Fla. 2020)
[2] Koikos v. Travelers Ins. Co., 849 So. 2d 269 (Fla. 2003)
[3] Sheriff of Broward County v. Evanston Insurance Company, U.S. Court of Appeals, 11th Circuit, No. 24-13317, decided Nov. 10, 2025
[4] For a detailed explanation, see Michael A. Packer, “Appellate Court Finds Term ‘Occurrence’ Ambiguous as It Pertains to Parkland Mass Shooting,” Marshall Dennehy Thought Leadership, Dec. 1, 2025; accessed at https://www.marshalldennehey.com/thought-leadership/appellate-court-finds-term-occurrence-ambiguous-as-it-pertains-to-parkland-mass-shooting
The author
Joseph S. Harrington, CPCU, is an independent business writer specializing in property and casualty insurance coverages and operations. For 21 years, Joe was the communications director for the American Association of Insurance Services (AAIS), a P&C advisory organization. Prior to that, Joe worked in journalism and as a reporter and editor in financial services.
