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PaperclipPerfector  2yr ago (text post)   31205 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 7, 2023

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You wouldn’t know it reading these judgements, but there is (theoretically) a controlling Supreme Court opinion regarding excessive punitive damages. State Farm v. Campbell, but since they didn’t say the magic words “punitive damages more than X are unconstitutional,” judges get discretion to pretend their favorite case is special and that these particular big meanies really do deserve it.

That seems to be an odd summary of a case which per your own cite says "the United States Supreme Court held that the due process clause usually limits punitive damage awards to less than ten times the size of the compensatory damages awarded and that punitive damage awards of four times the compensatory damage award is "close to the line of constitutional impropriety".

Okay, I’ll cite the opinion itself:

We decline again to impose a bright-line ratio which a punitive damages award cannot exceed. Our jurisprudence and the principles it has now established demonstrate, however, that, in practice, few awards exceeding a single-digit ratio between punitive and compensatory damages, to a significant degree, will satisfy due process. In Has lip, in upholding a punitive damages award, we concluded that an award of more than four times the amount of compensatory damages might be close to the line of constitutional impropriety. 499 U. S., at 23-24. We cited that 4-to-1 ratio again in Gore. 517 U. S., at 581. The Court further referenced a long legislative history, dating back over 700 years and going forward to today, providing for sanctions of double, treble, or quadruple damages to deter and punish. Id., at 581, and n. 33. While these ratios are not binding, they are instructive. They demonstrate what should be obvious: Single-digit multipliers are more likely to comport with due process, while still achieving the State's goals of deterrence and retribution, than awards with ratios in range of 500 to 1, id., at 582, or, in this case, of 145 to 1. Nonetheless, because there are no rigid benchmarks that a punitive damages award may not surpass, ratios greater than those we have previously upheld may comport with due process where "a particularly egregious act has resulted in only a small amount of economic damages."

But the next sentence says: "see also ibid. (positing that a higher ratio might be necessary where "the injury is hard to detect or the monetary value of noneconomic harm might have been difficult to determine"). The converse is also true, however. When compensatory damages are substantial, then a lesser ratio, perhaps only equal to compensatory damages, can reach the outermost limit of the due process guarantee." (Italics in original).

So, in a case arising out of the Volkswagen emissions fraud case, in which each plaintiff was awarded about $1000 in compensatory damages, the Ninth Circuit held, "This case does not support a punitive damages multiplier above a single digit ratio because the damages were not insignificant." Riley v. Volkswagen Group of America., 51 F. 4th 896, 903 (9th Cir 2022). Perhaps other circuits are more generous, but I would like to see actual evidence that the rule in fact has no teeth.

but I would like to see actual evidence that the rule in fact has no teeth.

Philip Morris USA Inc. v. Williams. The Supreme Court vacated and remanded a judgement of $79.5 million in punitive damages vs $821,000 in compensatory damages. The specific grounds was “A punitive damages award based in part on a jury’s desire to punish a defendant for harming nonparties amounts to a taking of property from the defendant without due process,” but State Farm was cited extensively in the opinion.

On remand, the Oregon Supreme Court basically said, “well, the jury didn’t punish the Phillip Morris for harming other people, they just used those harms to other people as evidence for how reprehensible Philip Morris’s conduct towards the plaintiff was, and then punished Phillip Morris for that conduct,” and reinstated the $79.5 million award.

Understandably, SCOTUS granted cert once again, but then dismissed the case instead of giving the Oregon court the smackdown it deserved, thus paving the way for courts across the nation to continue ignoring State Farm.

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