Homeowner sues Ace Alarms for $1.2 million
By Derek Rice
Updated Thu September 4, 2003
September 4, 2003
ANTIOCH, Tenn. - Ace Alarms Inc. faces a lawsuit in conjunction with a fire that destroyed a customer’s home last Christmas Eve.
The lawsuit alleges that Ace failed to properly install and monitor a security system that included fire detection equipment at the customer’s home, according to Russell Morgan of Boult, Cummings, Connor and Berry, who is representing the couple, Charles and Kathleen Lico.
The lawsuit, filed last month, states that “total destruction of the home and property could have been avoided†had Ace provided the fire detection the Licos claim they paid for. The Licos seek $1.2 million in damages from Ace.
Ace doesn’t dispute that its system failed to alert the couple to a fire at their home, said Thomas Lundborg, president of Ace Alarms. What Ace does dispute is whether the Licos had requested fire detection as part of the system Ace installed at their home in 1991. Ace upgraded the system in 1999.
Lundborg said he tried at the time to persuade the couple that fire detection would be as valuable, if not more so, than a burglar alarm, to no avail.
The Licos have also filed a lawsuit against their insurance carrier, Nationwide Mutual Fire Insurance Co., in which they seek $400,000.
Read more about this story in the October issue of Security Systems News.
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