Law Commons^™

Medical Malpractice And Wrongful Death: Some Lives Are Worth More Than Others, Ralph Peeples, Catherine T. Harris

Ralph Peeples

We examined the outcomes and case characteristics of all the wrongful death lawsuits defended by a medical malpractice insurer in Virginia and North Carolina from 2009 through 2014. We derived our data from the insurer's closed claims files. Our goal was to identify the factors that affected whether compensation was paid, as well as the factors that affected the amount of compensation, when that occurred. Using multivariate analysis, we found that four variables had predictive power: the claims adjuster's assessment of liability, the age of the deceased, the marital status of the deceased, and whether the primary physician-defendant was engaged …

Enduring Doctrine: The Collateral Source Rule In Wisconsin Injury Law, Joseph P. Poehlmann

Marquette Law Review

When the common law collateral source rule first arose in the area of tort law over one hundred years ago, only a minority of individuals maintained health insurance coverage to protect against loss in the event that a negligent actor injured them. Today, however, the vast majority of Americans are covered. Because of this change in the landscape of insurance coverage, many jurisdictions have abrogated or greatly eroded the collateral source rule under the belief that the rule no longer holds a justified role in personal injury litigation. Wisconsin, however, continues to follow the common law form of the rule …

Remedies: A Guide For The Perplexed, Doug Rendleman

Doug Rendleman

Remedies is one of a law student’s most practical courses. Remedies students and their professors learn to work with their eyes on the question at the end of litigation: what can the court do for the successful plaintiff? Remedies develops students’ professional identities and broadens their professional horizons by reorganizing their analysis of procedure, torts, contracts, and property around choosing and measuring relief - compensatory damages, punitive damages, an injunction, specific performance, disgorgement, and restitution. This article discusses the law-school course in Remedies - the content of the Remedies course, the Remedies classroom experience, and Remedies outside the classroom through …

Loss Of Chance, Probabilistic Cause, And Damage Calculations: The Error In Matsuyama V. Birnbaum And The Majority Rule Of Damages In Many Jurisdictions More Generally, Robert J. Rhee

Robert Rhee

This short commentary corrects an erroneous understanding of probabilistic causation in the loss-of-chance doctrine and the damage calculation method adopted in Matsuyama v. Birnbaum. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts is not alone. Many other common law courts have made the same error, including Indiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, and Oklahoma. The consistency in the mistake suggests that the error is the majority rule of damages. I demonstrate here that this majority rule is based on erroneous mathematical reasoning and the fallacy of probabilistic logic.

The Availability Of Benefit Of The Bargain Expectancy-Based Damages For Buyers Defrauded In California Real Estate Transactions, Laurence A. Steckman, Robert E. Conner, Kris Steckman Taylor

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Distinguishing The Concept Of Strict Liability For Ultra-Hazardous Activities From Strict Products Liability Under Section 402a Of The Restatement (Second) Of Torts: Two Parallel Lines Of Reasoning That Should Never Meet, Charles E. Cantu

Akron Law Review

The cornerstone of tort law in our Anglo-American system of jurisprudence is based upon three generally accepted principles. The first is that by awarding any individual monetary damages after their injury, we can make them whole, and the second is the concept of the reasonable prudent person. The third, and the focal point of this article, is that liability is imposed, and the corresponding right to recovery is created, not because of the fact that the plaintiff is injured, but because the injury is the result of the defendant’s fault.

Fault, as each first year law student is quick to …

Introduction: Fourth Remedies Discussion Forum, David F. Partlett, Russell L. Weaver

Akron Law Review

Introduction to the articles in this section...Three of the articles provide an overview on the subject...The next two articles suggest the desirability of a historical approach to tort reform...A couple of articles focus on the problem of statutory damage and appeal bond caps...A couple of articles question the efficacy and legitimacy of prior tort reforms, both legislative and judicial...The last article in this section, Professor Michael Kelly’s What Makes the Collateral Source Rule Different?, analyzes Paul H. Rubin and Joanna M. Sheperd’s working paper on a “correlation between tort reforms and the rate of fatal accidents in the states which …

To Dollars From Sense: Qualitative To Quantitative Translation In Jury Damage Awards, Valerie P. Hans, Valerie F. Reyna

Valerie P. Hans

This article offers a new multistage account of jury damage award decision making. Drawing on psychological and economic research on judgment, decision making, and numeracy, the model posits that jurors first make a categorical gist judgment that money damages are warranted, and then make an ordinal gist judgment ranking the damages deserved as low, medium, or high. They then construct numbers that fit the gist of the appropriate magnitude. The article employs data from jury decision-making research to explore the plausibility of the model.

Too Many Cooks In The Climate Change Kitchen: The Case For An Administrative Remedy For Damages Caused By Increased Greenhouse Gas Concentrations, Benjamin Reese

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

Recent federal and state court decisions have made clear that federal common law claims against emitters of greenhouse gases are not sustainable; however, those same courts seem to have given state common law tort claims the green light, at least if the claims are brought in the state where the polluters are located. This Note contends that such suits are not an adequate remedy for those injured by climate change because they will face nearly insurmountable barriers in state court, and because there are major policy-level drawbacks to relying on state tort law rather than a federal solution. This Note …

Concubinage And Union Libre: A Historical Comparison Of The Rights Of Unwed Cohabitants In Wrongful Death Actions In France And Louisiana, Robert F. Taylor

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Impairment Of The Operation Of The Warsaw Convention By Recent Legislative And Judicial Action, Alan N. Sutin

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Interim Payments And Economic Damages To Compensate Private-Party Victims Of Hazardous Releases, Julie E. Steiner

Marquette Law Review

There is a gap in tort recovery for many hazardous release victims. Hazardous spill victims receive different damage compensation based solely upon the type of hazardous substance released, with oil spill victims benefitting from a number of statutory damage recovery mechanisms that victims of other type of hazardous substance releases do not receive. Specifically, those injured by oil spills receive interim payments and recover for their economic loss. Yet, many victims injured by non-oil hazardous spills will incur economic harm but will not receive compensation because of a prohibition on recovery for economic loss absent accompanying physical injury or private …

American Punitive Damages Vs. Compensatory Damages In Promoting Enforcement In Democratic Nations Of Civil Judgements To Deter State-Sponsors Of Terrorism, Jeffrey F. Addicott

University of Massachusetts Law Review

Unfortunately, while the United States has established several legal avenues for civil litigation by private citizens of terror attacks against States that sponsor terrorism, a major stumbling block in terms of effectiveness rests in the reality that fellow democratic nations in the international community refuse to honor or domesticate the monetary judgments of American courts. Acknowledging that there are a plethora of political and legal obstacles associated with establishing a workable mechanism for fellow democracies to enforce the “terror” judgments of American courts, one reason that is often raised by critics is the strong objection to the matter of American …

Product Liability Law In Japan: An Introduction To A Developing Area Of Law, Younghee Jin Ottley, Bruce L. Ottley

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Nonmaterial Misrepresentation: Damages, Rescission, And The Possibility Of Efficient Fraud, Emily Sherwin

Emily L Sherwin

Buried in the details of legal doctrine governing misrepresentation is a remedial anomaly that raises some interesting questions about how law should deal with moral wrongs such as fraud. We tend to think of deliberate deception--fraud--as a grave moral wrong. At least, we think of deception as gravely wrong when the deceiver's objective is not to avert harm or spare feelings, but to obtain someone's money or goods. Deception denies the autonomy of the person deceived and undermines the foundation of trust in human interaction. The law, however, does not penalize every instance of fraud. Moreover, the standards governing when …

International Mass Tort Litigation: Forum Non Conveniens And The Adequate Alternative Forum In Light Of The Bhopal Disaster, Stephen L. Cummings

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Cocktails On Campus: Are Libations A Liability?, Susan S. Bendlin

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Recent Development: Espina V. Jackson: The Local Government Tort Claims Act Limits Local Government's Liability For Constitutional Tort Claims Committed By Its Employees; Local Government Employees Acting With Actual Malice Are Liable For Their Own Torts; And Multiple Wrongful Death Actions Arising From The Same Underlying Conduct May Be Aggregated For Purposes Of The Damages Cap, Kristin E. Shields

University of Baltimore Law Forum

The Court of Appeals of Maryland held that the damages cap of the Local Government Tort Claims Act (“LGTCA”) limits a local government’s liability for damages caused by an employee’s tortious act in violation of the state constitution. Espina v. Jackson, 442 Md. 311, 317, 112 A.3d 442, 446 (2015). The court also held that this limitation does not contradict the supremacy of the state constitution. Id. at 335, 112 A.3d at 456. Furthermore, the court held the LGTCA damages cap is not an unreasonable restriction on the right to remedy under Article 19 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights. …

Compensating The Victims Of Japan’S 3-11 Fukushima Disaster, Eric A. Feldman

All Faculty Scholarship

Japan’s March 2011 triple disaster—first a large earthquake, followed by a massive tsunami and a nuclear meltdown—caused a devastating loss of life, damaged and destroyed property, and left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, hurt, and in need. This article looks at the effort to address the financial needs of the victims of the 3/11 disaster by examining the role of public and private actors in providing compensation, describing the types of groups and individuals for whom compensation is available, and analyzing the range of institutions through which compensation has been allocated. The story is in some ways cause for …

Liability Insurer Data As A Window On Lawyers’ Professional Liability, Tom Baker, Rick Swedloff

All Faculty Scholarship

Using the best publicly available data on lawyers’ liability claims and insurance – from the largest insurer of large law firms in the U.S., the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Professional Liability, and a summary of large claims from a leading insurance broker–this article reports the frequency of lawyers’ liability claims, the distribution and cost of claims by type of practice, the disposition of claims, and lawyers liability insurance premiums from the early 1980s to 2013. Notable findings include remarkable stability over thirty years in the distribution of claims by area of practice among both small and large firms, …

Interim Payments And Economic Damages To Compensate Private-Party Victims Of Hazardous Releases, Julie E. Steiner

Faculty Scholarship

There is a gap in tort recovery for many hazardous release victims. Hazardous spill victims receive different damage compensation based solely upon the type of hazardous substance released, with oil spill victims benefitting from a number of statutory damage recovery mechanisms that victims of other type of hazardous substance releases do not receive. Specifically, those injured by oil spills receive interim payments and recover for their economic loss. Yet, many victims injured by non-oil hazardous spills will incur economic harm but will not receive compensation because of a prohibition on recovery for economic loss absent accompanying physical injury or private …