Punitive Damages
By seeking to limit punitive damages and raise
the evidentiary standard for such awards, so-called "reformers"
would strip individuals of the power to make reckless or malicious defendants
change their misconduct.
Punitive damages are awarded in less than 5 percent
of civil jury verdicts, according to a 1990 American Bar Foundation study
of 25,000 jury verdicts in 11 states over a four-year period. Between
1965 and 1990, there were only 355 such awards in products liability cases,
according to a study by law professor Michael Rustad of Suffolk University
in Boston. And more than half of those awards were reduced or overturned
on appeal. The rarity of punitive damages helps to explain why such awards
often have news value. Moreover, the U.S. Supreme Court has mandated that
courts carefully scrutinize such awards.
Contrary to allegations about the overuse and
excessiveness of punitive damage awards, data collected in the most recent
National Center for State Courts (NCSC) study reveals that they are awarded
in only 6 percent of tort cases in which the defendant was found liable.
Further, the NCSC study indicates that the median award of punitive damages
is $50,000.
A 1995 U.S. Department of Justice study analyzing
civil jury cases over a 12-month period in the nation's 75 most populous
counties found that juries awarded punitive damages in just 6 percent of
all successful suits, and that approximately half of these punitive damage
awards were for $50,000 or less.
The number of punitive damage awards between
1990 and 1994 in San Francisco and Cook County (Illinois) decreased 59
percent from the 1985-89 period, according to data from a 1995 study by
the Rand Institute for Civil Justice. In the 1990-94 period, punitive damages
were awarded in only 2 percent of all cases in San Francisco and in 1 percent
of all Cook County cases.
In nearly 80 percent of the products liability
cases in which punitive damages were awarded, the manufacturer made a subsequent
safety change, professor Rustad found. Beyond that, just the threat of
punitive damages causes safety to be taken into account, thereby resulting
in a safer America.
Limiting punitive damages to an arbitrary level
would undercut their deterrent value since reckless or malicious defendants
might find it cheaper and more cost effective to continue their bad behavior
and to risk paying punitive damages.
Americans would be much worse off if they were
not able to hold wrongdoers accountable. The makers of asbestos certainly
did not voluntarily assume responsibility for the harm they caused. The
A.H. Robins Company did not offer to compensate the thousands of women
injured by the Dalkon Shield. It is only the civil justice system and punitive
damages that have placed accountability where it belongs -- at the door
of the wrongdoer.
Given the facts, why do the proponents of legal
revisions seek to protect the reckless and malicious from bearing responsibility
for their acts? In addition, why do they base policy recommendations on
misrepresented anecdotes? The threat of punitive damages deters egregious
misconduct.
Used with permission from
The Association of Trial
Lawyers of America. All rights reserved.
DISCLAIMER
This information has been prepared only for general purposes
and is not legal advice. Presentation of this information is
not intended to create an attorney-client relationship. Do
not act upon this information without seeking professional
counsel.
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