Runaway Jury Verdicts
We usually view the recurrent headlines: a plaintiff has been awarded a huge sum of money in damage for an emotional or physical injury supposedly sustained from a large corporation or small enterprise. Depute the fact that many people congratulate the injured party for holding the defendant accountable, there has been a rise of the disgraceful jury verdicts which need to change. The civil justice system was created based on “justice for all” and not justice for only the injured party (plaintiffs). The law is meant to develop a playing field equal for all in determining how and whether to compensate anyone who has suffered any loss. However, in this new reality, the injured plaintiff’s creative lawyers have hijacked the justice system to find themselves better at hurry trials than their defense lawyers.
The situation makes most of the corporations aim at the civil justice system by pointing out the “jackpot justice” and “runaway jury verdicts.” The companies indicate that they can not trust a jury, which is created from ordinary people to decide on problems such as whether a doctor or a hospital has committed malpractice and the level of compensation that could be reasonable and fair to the injured party. Due to these mistrust and the impact of the “runaway jury verdict,” there has been a question of whether it can be changed. Hence the paper will discuss whether one of the strategies (capping damages awards) would help runaway jury verdicts.
How the Runaway Jury Verdicts Occurs
Runaway jury is made up of jurors who tend to make up their own decisions and use their rights in law to act independently. They are individuals who do not pay any attention to prosecutors and court instructions. When they are told to present their cases, most of the companies tend to select a jury. Over the years, juries have been known to be conservative in awarding compensation and finding faults. The question stands how does a runaway jury verdict happen? One thing to know is that the emotional motivator of such a judgment is anger and not sympathy.
Hence, the plaintiff uses several strategies that will incite the juror’s anger, such as using the” Reptile Theory,” where the plaintiff lawyer taps into the juror’s brains and instigates a fight. Its effects tend to shift the juror focus from the standard of care or law to complete safety at total cost and absence of the danger. To defuse the juror’s anger, the defense is advised to address the parts of the case that are most difficult with the jury. Secondly, the security needs to personalize the business defendants (Greene,232). Furthermore, there is the implementation of the approach of capping the damage awards. It is an approach that has been accepted but others but rejected and a means of helping with the runaway jury verdicts. Whether the process helps or nor depends with whether the jury is aware or not of the capping of the damaged awards,
Capping Damages Awards
Damage awards can be categorized into punitive damage awards that punish the defendants for evil conduct, willful, or malicious. It is defendant-focus where the jury needs to determine the money to deter and punish the defendant effectively. The second one is compensatory damages, which tend to return the injured plaintiff to their condition before they were injured (Hastie et al. 317). It is an aspect that focuses on economic damages and non-economic damages. The jury is usually responsible for rewarding for such damages where sometimes they take advantage of their power. In response to the concerns about the excessive damage awards by the runaway juries, the state legislatures and the congress decided to impose some statutory limits on the damages. It is an act that is known as capping the damages awards. It is an act that tends to limit the ability of the runaway juror to award excessive damages. It is vital to put such a cap on damages to prevent the “runaway juries from threatening the economic viability of insurance, business, and health care.
For example, in the healthcare industry, the enactment of a damage cap will ensure adequate compensation for the medical malpractices’ victims. Secondly, it will allow the healthcare insurers to reduce their malpractice insurance premiums by decreasing the awards’ size and finally reducing the total healthcare costs by lowering the malpractice insurance premiums for healthcare consumers. Secondly, the proponents argue that a cap on damages is vital to reduce the culture of fear of defendants such as the doctors. For an instant, the current civil justice system has brought a “culture of fear” for the doctors that have made them not to report any medical errors since they are afraid that when they reveal such information, it will be used against them in court that will cause them to lose a lot of money to the plaintiff. Hence there is the need for a cap on the non-economic damages to ensure the treatment, healthcare, and the defendants do not suffer (Hastie et al. 318).
Thirdly, those in favor of the damaged caps believe that the damages might be awarded in any personal injury lawsuits to avoid any excessive verdict by the irresponsible jury. They base their ruling on emotions and not reason. It is because these high rewards might harm the economy. Fourthly is that damage cap might help with runway jury verdict since it will control the powers they have when determining the amount to charge a respondent and reduce the defendant’s potential liability and prevent high cost from being given to the consumes (Hastie et al. 318).
Moreover, those against damaged caps believe that what the proponents argue for is possible when the jury is not aware of the lid on the damaged awards. It is because, when they come to find out that there is a cap place down on the damages, they will manipulate the situation in favor of the plaintiff and their decision the jury makes. After all, they will be influenced by the statutory cap presence. It is where the juror will adjust the size of the damaged reward to meet the damaged statutory caps. For example, in cases where there is a high severity of injuries, the jury will decrease the damage size to meet the damage cap. In contrast, in medium and low severity of injuries, the jury will increase the damage size to meet the damaged cap. It is an act that brings about bias by the runaway jury when making their verdict (Kalven, 162).
Secondly is that the opponents of damaged caps believe that when the defendants know that there is a cap placed on damages awards, they may not be willing to settle the existing case early because they know that the prize can only reach to a certain amount where they can easily prolog the case. It will, in turn, cost both the involved arty more resources and legal fees. Thirdly, damaged caps tend to the amount the injured plaintiff needs to receive rightfully and favor the defendant, which also brings about the jury’s unfair decision (Kalven, 162).
Conclusion
Both the people who were for and against capping the damaged awards in helping with runaways jury verdicts have their points of reason. Moreover, I believe there should be a need for a damage cap to reduce biases portrayed by the jury when awarding damages by reducing the plaintiff’s excessive damage awards. It will then help improve the economy due to improvement in the operation of the business, insurance, and health care. However, I also believe that this should be placed by ensuring that the jury is unaware that there are damaged caps to avoid them being manipulated by the presence of the statutory damaged cap.
References
Greene, E. On juries and damage awards: The process of decision making. Law and Con-temporary Problems, 52, 1989, 225–246.
Hastie, R. Schkade, D. A, & Payne, J. W. Juror judgments in civil cases: Effects of plain-tiffs requests and plaintiff’s identity on punitive damage awards. Law and Human Behavior, 23, 1999, 445–600
Kalven, H. The jury, the law, and the personal injury damage award. 1958. Ohio State Law Journal, 19, 1958, 159–178.