Ohio Supreme Court upholds tort reform provision

On February 15, 2012, the Ohio Supreme Court turned away a challenge to a tort reform measure requiring the bifurcation of trials to separate any decision to award punitive damages from the decision to award compensatory damages. The Ohio legislature enacted the provision in 2005. It requires that the jury first decide the issue of liability and, if the defendant is found liable, the amount of compensatory damages required to compensate the plaintiff for his or her injuries. And then, in the cases where the jury is allowed to consider punitive damages, the jury then deliberates further regarding any award of punitive damages (i.e. Damages intended to punish a defendant for willful or grossly negligent conduct).

Personally, I think this tort reform measure is pretty dumb for the proponents of tort reform measures to support. When the jury returns a compensatory damage award and then the judge sends them back out to deliberate about awarding additional damages, its like the judge is telling the jury that they did not award enough the first time so they need to go award more. All good for the plaintiff and potentially costly for the defendant. And I have yet to hear what potential benefit this type of tort reform provides to the defendant.

This tort reform measure is also hardly needed. Very few cases make it to trial with punitive damages still at issue. Few cases merit even an allegation of punitive damages and those that do must also survive judicial scrutiny at both the summary judgment stage and at the punitive damage jury instruction stage. So bifurcation of trial is both contrary to the usual goal of tort reformists and also rarely comes into play.

For these reasons, the news from Ohio is not that bad for those who value justice.