Lynn Allen is the Managing Partner of Tyson & Mendes’ Phoenix office. Ms. Allen is an experienced trial lawyer who represents her clients in a wide variety of complex cases, including insurance coverage disputes, insurance bad faith, defense of personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits, intellectual property, employment law, and appeals. Ms. Allen has extensive appellate experience in both the Arizona state and federal courts. She has been lead counsel in many successful jury trials, arbitrations, summary judgment motions, and appeals. She is a frequent lecturer on insurance bad faith and coverage issues in Arizona.
Ms. Allen successfully defended an insurance company in a jury trial involving a $1.7 million claim of first party breach of contract and insurance bad faith arising from storm damage to plaintiff’s home. She also obtained summary judgment for her clients in a variety of high profile cases, including a wrongful death lawsuit against a condominium association arising from carbon monoxide poisoning; a claim for bad faith alleging breach of the duty to defend and indemnify against a $1.2 million construction defect claim; a bad faith claim arising from the denial of coverage and alleged breach of duty to defend an insured against a multi-million dollar wrongful death claim, with the court finding no coverage under the illegal consumption of alcohol exclusion; a bad faith claim arising from the denial of coverage for a multi-million dollar excess verdict in a wrongful death claim, with the court finding no coverage based on the physical abuse exclusion; and a bad faith claim arising from a residential theft, with the court finding the insured failed to cooperate and awarded attorneys’ fees to the insurer.
Ms. Allen earned her J.D. cum laude from the Arizona State University College of Law in 1989, where she served as a note and comment editor on the Law Review. She is licensed to practice law in Arizona and is a member of the Maricopa County Bar Association and Arizona Association of Defense Counsel. Ms. Allen is rated AV-Preeminent by Martindale-Hubbell and has been honored as a Southwest Super Lawyer for Insurance Coverage for 2011-2016.
In her free time, Ms. Allen enjoys spending time with her teenage son and cheering him on during his football games. She also enjoys traveling, especially cruising.
Recent Posts
“The future is female.” We hear this phrase often these days. Women are attending law school at high rates and we finally have a female vice-president. At Tyson & Mendes, we have exceptional female partners, women in various leadership roles (attorney and non-attorney), and the number of female attorneys we have practicing law at our firm is higher than the national average. But what about those women who have been practicing law and litigating for more than 20 or 30 years? The women who came before us – what are their stories? Here at Tyson & Mendes, we have many women who fit this bill. Our spotlight is on one such woman—a “trailblazer,” as one of her partners recently called her. This woman is Lynn Allen, the Managing and Equity Partner of Tyson & Mendes’ Arizona office.
The Arizona appellate courts recently issued two important decisions involving insurance coverage and bad faith. These decisions will impact the Arizona insurance industry and are discussed below.
A recent decision in Division One of the Court of Appeals held plaintiff must prove she would have prevailed in the underlying claim as an essential element of a legal malpractice claim.[i] In Bellemare v. Lemon Law Group Partners, the Court of Appeals set aside the verdict in favor of plaintiff Carol Bellemare and held a plaintiff must prove the case within the case. In other words, she must be able to prove, but for the attorney’s negligence, she would have been successful in the underlying case. To meet this burden in the legal malpractice case, plaintiff must present facts sufficient to prove all the elements of the underlying case.
Attorney at Law Magazine – February 18, 2021
Nationwide civil litigation defense firm Tyson & Mendes LLP announced today the promotion of two women to equity partner: Kristi Blackwell and Lynn Allen. With three men and five women equity partners, the firm is now nearly two-thirds women-owned.
Law360 – February 8, 2021
Civil defense firm Tyson & Mendes LLP, which reached gender parity among equity partners back in June, has promoted two more women to equity partner, making the firm more than 60% female-owned.
SAN DIEGO (February 5, 2021) – Less than a year after reaching gender parity in equity partnership – already a rarity in the legal industry – nationwide civil litigation defense firm Tyson & Mendes LLP announced today the promotion of two more women to equity partner: Kristi Blackwell and Lynn Allen. With three men and five women equity partners, the firm is now nearly two-thirds women-owned. Additional equity partners include Robert Tyson, Patrick Mendes, Mina Miserlis, James Sell, Susan Oliver, and Cayce Lynch.
Claims Magazine – August 2020
In March 2020, the United States came to a screeching halt. Schools closed, businesses shut down and the national economy saw its largest decline in more than a decade. The wave of insurance coverage litigation over COVID-19 losses was inevitable. And as policyholders seek to recoup business-related losses, business interruption claims are becoming the new normal. With insurance companies denying such claims for lack of physical damage or loss to property, bad faith lawsuits are soaring and businesses are suing their insurance companies in increasing numbers.
CLM – May 15, 2020
Lawsuits and Strategies as Businesses Remain Shut Down
Lynn Allen is the managing partner of Tyson & Mendes’ Phoenix office. After running her own practice for more than 10 years, she saw an opportunity to grow even further with the help of T&M’s unique defense methods, training program and marketing strategies. Read on to learn about some of her biggest accomplishments and how she maintains work-life balance.
Tyson & Mendes Arizona Partner Lynn Allen and associate Arman Nafisi obtained a significant appellate win in Arizona in September. In this case, the Arizona Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment in favor of agent Manny DeMiguel on plaintiffs’ claims for damages resulting from DeMiguel’s alleged failure to procedure adequate underinsured motorist (“UIM”) coverage on plaintiffs’ vehicle.