Georgia Finds Damage Caps Unconstitutional

The Georgia Supreme Court has found damage caps in medical malpractice lawsuits to be unconstitutional. Georgia is the second state to strike down damage caps this year, following the example of Illinois.

Damage caps are being challenged in several other states, including Missouri, Mississippi, and Kansas. These decisions may impact the lives of people with asbestos-related diseases, such as mesothelioma, who seek damages in court to care for themselves and their families.

Background: In 2005 the Georgia legislature passed a “tort reform” law that capped noneconomic damages at $350,000. To clarify, economic damages are based on expenses the plaintiff can prove at the time of the trial, through bills and receipts. But sometimes a person who is severely injured, and who faces long-term or lifelong impairment, is awarded noneconomic damages as well. Sometimes called “pain and suffering” damages, these awards are intended to compensate people for the probable expenses and loss of income caused by the injury in the years ahead.

In recent years several states have placed caps on noneconomic damages in malpractice and other personal injury cases. Many of these laws have been promoted by “activists” working on behalf of industry associations, who persuade lawmakers that their courts are being overrun by greedy litigants looking for “jackpot” awards. However, objective research finds that the “plague” of frivolous lawsuits clogging up the courts is a myth.

The Georgia case involved a woman named Betty Nestlehutt, who was left permanently disfigured by botched plastic surgery. After she won her original suit, Nestlehutt filed a motion to lift the cap on the damages she was awarded. Judge Diane E. Bessen of the State Court of Fulton County ruled that the damage cap was an unconstitutional infringement on Nestlehutt’s right to trial by jury under the Georgia constitution.

This week the Georgia Supreme Court agreed with Judge Bessen in a unanimous decision. The main points of Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt et al.are these:

Injury claims are encompassed in the right to a jury trial in the Georgia constitution. Determination of damages rests within the province of the jury. The power to reduce damage awards thought to be excessive is based on the courts’ constitutionally derived authority. Therefore, the power to modify jury awards belongs entirely to the judicial system, not the legislature.

The Court also found that their ruling applies “retroactively to the Nestlehutts’ case and any other cases that are pending, including those that have not completed the appeals process.”

Damage caps are the primary target of the “tort reform” movement, a cause underwritten by corporate interests such as tobacco companies facing lung cancer lawsuits and asbestos manufacturers whose employees were stricken with asbestosis and mesothelioma cancer. If more state courts toss out damage caps, the “tort reformers” are going to have to come up with a new plan.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010 at 8:26 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.