Sheri Pastor and Joann Lytle co-author chapter in The Law of Indemnification and Its Interplay with Liability Insurance: A Fifty-State Survey in the ABA Section of Litigation Fifty-State Survey.
Indemnity is compensation given to make another whole from a loss already sustained. It generally contemplates reimbursement by one person or entity of the entire amount of the loss or damage sustained by another. Indemnity takes two forms: common law and contractual. This survey is limited to considerations of contractual indemnity, but note that, historically, many states looked to the law relating to common law indemnity in developing their respective jurisprudence on contractual indemnity.