As one court stated, „the plaintiff should not be compensated for the harm suffered, but to punish and deter the defendant`s culpable conduct.“ Bongiovi v. Sullivan, 122 Nev. 556, 580, 138 pp.3d 433, 450 (Nev. 2006). The same court stated that „punitive damages are a means by which the community can express the community`s outrage or dislike of the misconduct of an oppressive, fraudulent or malicious defendant and by which others can be deterred and warned that such conduct will not be tolerated.“ With respect to a principal-agent relationship, courts are reluctant to award punitive damages to the principal for the agent`s reckless acts. An exception to this preference is if the customer favors or causes the agent`s recklessness. Punitive damages are an established principle of common law in the United States. [19] They are generally subject to state law (although they may also be granted under federal maritime law) and therefore differ in their application from state to state. In many states, including California and Texas, punitive damages are determined on the basis of law; Elsewhere, they can only be determined on the basis of case law. Many state laws are the result of lobbying the insurance industry to impose „caps“ on punitive damages; However, several state courts have struck down these legal caps as unconstitutional. [20] They are rare and occur in only 6% of civil cases leading to a monetary settlement. [21] Punitive damages are not available in certain jurisdictions, including Louisiana, Nebraska, Puerto Rico and Washington.
Punitive damages are, by their very nature, subjective. Since their purpose is to punish – rather than compensate – opinions on how to achieve this will vary greatly from juror to jury. In any event, research on punitive damages has uncovered some common principles. The defendant`s assets are positively correlated with high punitive damages. [26] The jury minimizes or ignores the jury`s instructions regarding punitive damages decisions. [27] And juries tend to punish defendants who have conducted a cost-benefit analysis. [28] If the clause meets both elements, the court usually applies the clause and finds no evidence of punitive damages. In National By-Products Inc.
v. Searcy House Moving Co. the Arkansas Supreme Court found that awarding punitive damages requires proof that the defendant intentionally committed an unlawful act after knowing that the act was likely to cause harm. Individuals may also be ordered to pay punitive damages that injure another person due to negligent conduct. Examples include drunk driving or distracted driving. In both cases, the defendant would have deliberately chosen conduct that could easily harm another person. It may even involve violations of anti-discrimination laws in New York. The damages are intended to compensate the plaintiffs for the actual losses they have suffered.
This type of premium may be to reimburse medical treatments, medical bills, or future expenses they have due to an injury they have sustained due to the negligence of another person or entity. This is usually actual damage. The law is less clear on cheap injustice. In Harris v. Digital Pulse Pty Ltd,[7] the defendant workers knowingly breached their contractual and fiduciary duties to their employer by diverting transactions to themselves and misusing their confidential information. The New South Wales Court of Appeal ruled that punitive damages were not available in the event of breach of contract or breach of fiduciary duty. Heydon YES (as it was then) stated that there was no power to award punitive damages in a claim for equity, although he merely decided the case for the narrow reason that there is no power to award punitive damages for the specific tort in equity. Justice Spigelman agreed, but noted that the contractual nature of the trust in question was and refrained from deciding whether punitive damages were available for just wrong, which was more akin to tort.
Mason P disagreed, arguing that there was no primary reason to award punitive damages in respect of tort at common law, but not for a similar tort of equity. Article 96 of the Treaty Adopted on 28. The Food Safety Law passed by the PRC in February 2009 increases punitive damages to ten times the purchase price, in addition to the damages the victim has already claimed from the manufacturer or seller for poor quality food that does not meet food safety standards.