In 5-4 ruling, Supreme Court curbs punitive damages
The San Francisco Chronicle
February 21, 2007

The U.S. Supreme Court set new limits Tuesday on punitive damages against makers of dangerous products and other corporate wrongdoers, ruling that jurors can award damages only for harm suffered by the plaintiff and not by other victims of the same conduct.

But lawyers and commentators sharply disputed the effects of the 5-4 decision on multimillion-dollar verdicts against tobacco companies, automakers and other defendants.

The ruling "will have a very helpful effect in a wide array of cases, particularly product liability cases," serving to "restrict the size and scope of punitive damages," said Theodore Boutrous, a Los Angeles attorney who has represented carmakers in cases raising similar issues, including one pending before the high court.

But Richard Daynard, a law professor and founder of the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern University in Boston, predicted the ruling would have few effects on smoking-related suits such as the Oregon case that the court ruled on Tuesday.

"I don't think it's likely to make a difference to most jurors,'' he said, noting that the justices did not prohibit juries from considering the evidence of harm done to other people in awarding punitive damages. Dissenting justices called the ruling incomprehensible and wondered how lower courts were supposed to interpret it.