Case Law Update: Heritage Property & Casualty v. Rapkin — First DCA Quashes Order Compelling Disclosure of Sealed DFS Claim-Handling Records

On November 4, 2026, Florida’s First District Court of Appeal granted consolidated petitions for writ of certiorari filed by Heritage Property & Casualty Insurance Company, Florida Peninsula Insurance Company, and Edison Insurance Company against Jeffrey A. Rapkin, Virginia M. Rapkin, Benjamin Mandell, Jordan Lee, and the Florida Department of Financial Services in Heritage Property & Casualty Insurance Co. v. Rapkin, Nos. 1D2026-1153 and 1D2026-1171. In the consolidated circuit court litigation—where the insurers sued over records from a Department investigation into claim-handling practices, the Rapkins sought mandamus, and Mandell and Lee intervened—the First District quashed a March 26, 2026 Order for Pre-Hearing Process that compelled production of 878 sealed pages before the trial court decided whether the records were exempt. Judges Lewis, Winokur, and Neff concurred in the per curiam opinion remanding for a confidentiality-preserving exemption and trade-secret determination; the opinion is not final until disposition of any timely rehearing motion.

How the Dispute Reached the First District

According to the opinion, the dispute arose from public-records requests tied to a Department of Financial Services investigation into insurers’ claim-handling practices. Florida Peninsula and Edison filed one action and Heritage filed another seeking declaratory and injunctive relief to prevent disclosure of claimed trade secrets, while the Rapkins petitioned for mandamus to compel disclosure. The trial court consolidated all three suits, abated the mandamus action, and allowed Mandell and Lee to intervene after they filed public-records requests of their own.

Under a joint litigation plan adopted by the court, the Department was to submit redacted and unredacted records under seal, followed by an in camera review and an evidentiary hearing on trade-secret status. After the Department submitted the records under seal, however, the trial court conducted only an “initial review,” which “did no more than identify which of the 878 sealed pages carried a claimed exemption.”

On March 26, 2026, the trial court entered the Order for Pre-Hearing Process stating that it “will not conduct the hearing in camera” and directing that the sealed records be provided to the requestor-intervenors, who could “participate fully” in the hearing and take discovery under a confidentiality order. The next day, Lee—who “is also engaged in separate litigation against Heritage”—served discovery requests on Florida Peninsula and Edison and later noticed the deposition of Heritage’s corporate representative. On April 16, 2026, the court granted only a temporary stay, and the insurers sought certiorari.

What the First District Decided

1. Premature disclosure of claimed trade secrets threatens irreparable harm that a confidentiality order does not cure. Quoting Lacaretta Restaurant v. Zepeda, 115 So. 3d 1091, 1092 (Fla. 1st DCA 2013), the court noted that certiorari requires “(1) a departure from the essential requirements of the law, (2) resulting in material injury for the remainder of the case (3) that cannot be corrected on postjudgment appeal.” Quoting Wal-Mart Stores East, L.P. v. Endicott, 81 So. 3d 486, 490–91 (Fla. 1st DCA 2011), it explained that “once the documents are disseminated, a privacy or trade secret interest has been invaded which cannot be remedied on direct appeal.” Quoting Shands Teaching Hospital & Clinics, Inc. v. Beylotte, 357 So. 3d 307, 309 (Fla. 1st DCA 2023)—“[O]nce the information becomes public, its confidentiality is lost forever”—the court held that a confidentiality order did not prevent the harm and noted that Lee’s next-day discovery showed the risk was “not hypothetical.”

2. Section 624.4213(2), Florida Statutes, and precedent bar production before a trade-secret ruling. Quoting Messer v. E.G. Pump Controls, Inc., 667 So. 2d 321, 322 (Fla. 1st DCA 1995), the court noted it had found “a departure from the essential requirements of law where, despite the assertion of a trade secret privilege, the trial court ordered production of documents without first conducting an examination of the documents.” Where a timely suit is filed, section 624.4213(2), Florida Statutes, bars release of records containing claimed trade secrets until a circuit court rules on their status. Ordering production first “violates the statutory safeguards and defeats the declaratory actions’ purpose, giving the requestors access regardless of how the exemption is decided.”

3. Non-party insured privacy and non-competitor requestors. To the extent the records contain sensitive personal information of non-party insureds, the court noted that such data is independently protected by statute and the Florida Constitution. Nor did the finding that the requestor-intervenors “are in no sense competitors of the Insurers” save the order: ordering production before adjudicating trade-secret status deprives the insurers of the opportunity to carry their burden. The panel took “no position on whether the records are trade secrets or otherwise exempt.”

What This Means If You Have a Florida Property Insurance Claim

Rapkin is a procedural certiorari ruling on trade-secret assertions over Department of Financial Services files; it does not decide any homeowner’s claim or whether the 878 pages are actually exempt. Still, it suggests several practical points:

• Regulatory file requests face a threshold review. Under section 624.4213(2), Florida Statutes, when a submitter files suit within 30 days after receiving notice of a request for documents marked and certified as trade secrets, the Department may not release them while the action is pending. In Rapkin, the court also required the exemption ruling to precede any production or access through a confidentiality-preserving in camera inspection or evidentiary hearing.
• Insurers still bear the burden on remand. The First District took “no position on whether the records are trade secrets or otherwise exempt.”
• Non-party insured data is protected. Florida law protects non-party insureds’ Social Security numbers and personal financial or health data in regulatory files.
• Keep your own claim file complete. Because public-records disputes take time, homeowners should preserve their own policy, correspondence, photos, estimates, and denial letters.

If your Florida property claim has been denied or underpaid, see our denied insurance claim guide, browse our Case Law & Industry Insights page, or request a free case evaluation. This article is general information, not legal advice.