Inflation-Adjusted Replacement-Cost Damages Plus Pre-Judgment Interest Do Not Constitute Double Recovery
Central Baptist Church of Albany, Georgia Inc. v. Church Mutual Insurance Co., 22-11082 (11th Cir. July 21 2025)

Introduction

This appeal—springing from a nine-year dispute over hail damage to a church roof—presented the Eleventh Circuit with two principal questions:

1. Did the district court err by excluding the insurer’s evidence that the church misrepresented a later claim with another carrier?
2. Did the court err in refusing to disturb a $1.75 million jury verdict (plus 7 % prejudgment interest) that was based on increased construction costs rather than the roof’s value on the 2014 date of loss?

The panel (Jordan & Pryor, JJ.; Moreno, D.J. sitting by designation) affirmed across the board. In doing so it:

• Announced that awarding inflation-adjusted replacement-cost damages and statutory prejudgment interest does not create an impermissible “double recovery” under Georgia law because the two measures compensate for different injuries.
• Reinforced the principle that a party’s explicit withdrawal of an affirmative defense—and acquiescence in jury instructions—waives the issue on appeal (“invited error”).
• Highlighted the deferential abuse-of-discretion review that governs post-trial Rule 59 motions and evidentiary rulings.

Summary of the Judgment

1. Evidentiary ruling. The insurer argued that the church’s undisclosed 2018 Hurricane Michael claim with a different carrier was a material misrepresentation voiding the 2014 policy. The district court excluded the evidence, finding no triable proof of materiality. At trial the insurer withdrew all affirmative defenses, including fraud, and concurred that no misrepresentation question would go to the jury. The Eleventh Circuit held the defense was therefore waived and declined to review the exclusion.

2. Rule 59 motion. After a $1.75 million verdict (plus 7 % interest), the insurer sought a new trial or remittitur, contending that (a) replacement cost had to be fixed “as of the time of loss,” (b) evidence of increased costs was speculative, and (c) adding interest duplicated the inflation adjustment. The panel affirmed the denial of the motion because:

• The insurer invited the very jury instruction it later attacked (replacement cost with no “date-of-loss” limitation).
• It withdrew an objection to the contractor’s testimony on rising prices, thereby forfeiting the evidentiary challenge.
• Sufficient evidence (two detailed estimates plus lay testimony on 4-8 % annual cost increases) supported the award.
• Prejudgment interest compensates for the lost use of money, whereas inflation-adjusted damages restore lost buying power; the two are distinct under Georgia’s prohibition on double recovery.

Analysis

Precedents Cited and Their Influence

• Perry v. State Farm, 734 F.2d 1441 (11th Cir. 1984) – Sets the standard that material misrepresentation is ordinarily a jury question unless no reasonable inference supports it. The district court employed this standard when excluding the misrepresentation evidence.
• Haygood v. Auto-Owners, 995 F.2d 1512 (11th Cir. 1993) – Confirms abuse-of-discretion review for evidentiary rulings; relied upon for appellate standard.
• St. Luke’s Cataract & Laser Inst. v. Sanderson, 573 F.3d 1186 (11th Cir. 2009) – Provides the framework for reviewing duplicative damages; cited in the double-recovery discussion.
• Johansen v. Combustion Eng’g, 170 F.3d 1320 (11th Cir. 1999) – Limits judicial power to disturb jury verdicts absent unreasonableness; used to uphold the damage figure.
• Junior v. Graham, 870 S.E.2d 378 (Ga. 2022) – Georgia Supreme Court definition of double recovery; key to distinguishing interest from inflation adjustments.
• Procter & Gamble Distrib. Co. v. Sherman, 2 F.2d 165 (S.D.N.Y. 1924) (L. Hand, J.) – Quoted for the economic rationale of prejudgment interest.

Legal Reasoning

1. Waiver & Invited Error

The panel applied the classic definition of waiver—“voluntary, intentional relinquishment of a known right” (Glass v. United of Omaha)—to hold that Church Mutual’s on-record withdrawal of all affirmative defenses, coupled with silence at the charge conference, extinguished the misrepresentation issue. Because appellate courts “do not review what was never preserved,” any error in excluding the evidence was irrelevant.

2. Standards of Review

• Evidentiary exclusions – abuse of discretion.
• Denial of Rule 59 new-trial/remittitur – abuse of discretion; factual determinations reviewed for clear error.
• Duplicate-damage determinations – clear-error review.

3. Replacement-Cost Measure

The policy stated that property would be valued at “replacement cost … as of the time of loss,” but the insurer approved a jury instruction omitting that clause. Under the doctrine of invited error, the court refused to let the insurer “sandbag” the jury by later claiming the instruction was wrong.

4. Sufficiency of Evidence on Cost Inflation

Two professional estimates—$1.377 million and $1.480 million—were prepared under the policy’s “comparable kind and quality” clause. Austin Burton, a contractor, added testimony that prices had risen 4-8 % annually because of tariffs and supply shocks. The jury used this information to peg damages at $1.75 million, comfortably within the evidentiary range.

5. No Double Recovery

The key analytical move was to separate time-value harm from purchasing-power harm:

Prejudgment interest replaces the economic benefit the defendant had from holding the plaintiff’s money; inflation adjustment restores the plaintiff’s ability to buy the same goods today that it could have bought when the breach occurred.

Because each measure redresses a distinct injury, awarding both does not offend Georgia’s bar on “multiple damages for the same wrong.”

Impact on Future Litigation

• Georgia-law property claims: Plaintiffs may now cite this case to recover (i) replacement-cost figures that reflect post-breach market escalation and (ii) statutory prejudgment interest without fear of a double-recovery objection.
• Insurance misrepresentation defenses: Insurers must guard their affirmative defenses throughout trial; an explicit withdrawal or failure to object will likely foreclose appellate review.
• Trial strategy: The decision underscores that careless acquiescence in jury instructions can be fatal on appeal (“you own what you ask for”).
• Evidentiary practice: Litigants cannot save Rule 59 arguments by reviving objections withdrawn at trial; courts will deem them waived.

Complex Concepts Simplified

• Replacement Cost – The expense of rebuilding or replacing the damaged property with materials of like kind and quality today, without deducting depreciation.
• Prejudgment Interest – Statutory or contractual interest added from the date of the breach to compensate for the lost use of money.
• Inflation-Adjusted Damages – A damages figure increased to reflect higher costs of labor and materials that accrue while litigation is pending.
• Waiver – An intentional relinquishment of a known right; once waived, the issue is gone for good.
• Invited Error – A party cannot complain on appeal about an error it induced the trial court to make (e.g., accepting a faulty jury instruction).
• Rule 59 (New Trial/Alter Judgment) – A post-verdict motion used to correct manifest errors of law or fact, or to consider newly discovered evidence; not a vehicle for re-arguing points that could have been raised earlier.
• Rule 50 (Judgment as a Matter of Law) – A motion challenging the evidentiary sufficiency before the case goes to the jury; failure to renew under Rule 50(b) narrows appellate review.

Conclusion

Central Baptist Church v. Church Mutual settles two practical questions in Georgia-based property insurance litigation: (1) an insurer that abandons its fraud defense at trial cannot resurrect it on appeal, and (2) juries may award both inflation-adjusted replacement-cost damages and prejudgment interest without violating the prohibition on double recovery because the two components remedy different economic harms.

The decision thus strengthens policyholders’ ability to obtain full economic restoration after protracted coverage disputes and serves as a cautionary tale for litigants who underestimate the finality of strategic concessions in the trial court.