The Los Angeles Times
February  05, 1998

By Alan Abrahamson

Heirs of Holocaust Victims Sue Insurer; Suit asking for $135 million

Flanked by an aunt who is a Holocaust survivor and a 1930s photo of his grandparents and his wife, Alan Stern announced at a news conference that the trust his family put in the Italian insurance company Assicurazioni Generali, was "cruelly betrayed." The Stern family, along with four other families, filed the $135 million suit against Generali for failing to pay on decades-old policies. "This is not charity. This is our due," said the 55-year old survivor, Anne Stern.

Later that day, a spokesperson for Generali stated the company owes the Sterns nothing.

"The heirs of the Holocaust are frankly disgusted with Generali and its affiliates for doing business as usual," said Alan Stern's wife, Lisa, a Los Angeles attorney and co-council to William Shernoff. Stern and Shernoff, a nationally recognized expert in bad-faith cases, filed the suit.