Page 4 - FDCC Insights Spring 2022

Alycen Moss
Coverage Issues Regarding Riots, Civil Commotion, and Curfews
By Alycen Moss
Following the death of George Floyd in May 2020, protests and riots broke out in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and spread to another 140 cities throughout the United States. The National Guard was called in to at least 21 states and Washington, D.C. The level of property damage inflicted during the ensuing unrest made it the costliest civil disorder in U.S. history, according to data compiled by the Property Claim Services unit (“PCS”) of Verisk Analytics, a data analytics company.1
The PCS tracks insurance claims, and classifies insured losses that exceed $25 million as a “catastrophe” event. According to the PCS, there were only 12 riot and civil disorder catastrophe events from 1950 through 2019. The average loss to the insurance industry from riot and civil
disorder catastrophes over those 70 years was around $90 million. The previous record for civil unrest damages was set in 1992 from rioting that occurred after a jury acquitted police officers who had been videotaped beating Rodney King. The PCS reported that insured losses from that event reached $775 million. In contrast, business losses resulting from the 2020 riots have exceeded $2 billion, far exceeding the previous record.2 For the first time, the PCS designated the civil unrest a multi-state catastrophe, ultimately including 20 states in the “catastrophe event.”
In the wake of the riots, many cities issued orders restricting access to areas affected by vandalism and looting and/or imposed curfews in anticipation of further
For a protest to constitute a “riot,” most states require multiple people engaged in tumultuous behavior involving either violence or the threat of violence. To constitute a “civil commotion,” most states require a prolonged disturbance of civil order such as widespread acts of looting.
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Insights SPRING2021
1 See https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-civil-disorders.
2 Verisk Analytics. PCS will not reveal an exact dollar figure from the violence, but it reveals
approximate figures.