Articles Posted in arbitrary damage caps

In 2011, the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature targeted some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens by enacting legislation that curtailed the legal rights of Medicaid recipients. Specifically, it imposed a cap on the amount of noneconomic damages—such as pain and suffering—that Medicaid recipients may recover in medical negligence cases. The pertinent provisions of that legislation, codified…

For those of us in Florida familiar with the constraints of the state’s sovereign immunity law, Florida Statute 768.28, the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. §§ 2671-2680, comes as a pleasant surprise. Under the state law, judgment damages against the state—or any of its agencies or subdivisions — are capped at $200,000 per…

One of the primary public policy reasons for having a robust civil justice system that is able to exact full compensatory damages from negligent actors is to encourage safe conduct. Short of criminal punishment, nothing motivates people and corporations to act responsibly more than the threat of losing money. Sovereign Immunity is a legal concept…