In a decision, if it stands, sure to have startlingly adverse consequences for Kentuckians injured or killed intentionally by others, the Kentucky Court of Appeals has ruled in the latest step in the tragic Trent DiGiurio case that constitutional due process imposes limitation on punitive damages liability for intentional killing and, it surely must follow, everything else too. This remarkably ill-advised ruling comes in Ragland v Estate of Trent DiGiuro, No 2009-CA-186 (October 22, 2010). This decision has been the subject of a previous posting, "The Trent DiGiurio Case: This Tragic Case Now Illustrates the Inadequacy of the Remedies Allowed by Kentucky Wrongful Death Law."
To recap partially that earlier posting:
Trent DiGiurio was a University of Kentucky football player. On the evening of his 21st birthday in 1994, he was killed by a single shot to the head while on the porch of his residence on Woodland Avenue in Lexington. In 2000, Shane Ragland was charged with DiGiurio's murder, was found guilty by a jury and was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment. Subsequently, however, the Kentucky Supreme Court reversed Ragland's decision and he later pleaded guilty to manslaughter, second-degree and received a sentence of eight years.
A wrongful death suit was prosecuted on behalf of Trent DiGiurio's estate. It was tried before a jury (neither Ragland nor his lawyer appeared at trial), which awarded $3,333,912 for destruction of Trent DiGiurio's power to work and earn money, $7796 in funeral expenses and $60 million in punitive damages. Fayette Circuit Judge Thomas E. Clark denial a post-trial motion to reduce the punitive damages assessed, observing that "to lie in wait, in the dark of night, and assassinate a person for purportedly being blackballed from a fraternity years earlier, the court can find no greater reprehensible conduct."
The Kentucky Court of Appeals (the panel comprising of Hon. Glenn E. Acree, Hon. Christopher Nickell and Senior Judge William Harris, who authored the Court' s opinion), however, agreed with Ragland and reduced the punitive damage award to $30 million.
That constitutional due process provides a limitation on corporate liability was introduced by the Supreme Court in a series of cases BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559 (1996), Cooper Industries, Inc. v. Leatherman Tool Group, Inc., 532 U.S. 424 (2001), and State Farm Insurance Company v. Campbell, 538 U.S. 408 (2003). These decisions establish a framework by which judges, particularly appellate court judges, may override a jury's verdict and represent a fundamental erosion in favor of corporate interests of the primacy of the jury – the only and the last government decision-making body that cannot be directly or indirectly purchased by corporate interests.
The "degree of reprehensibility" is the first component of the applicable analysis. While finding the intentional killing of Trent DiGiurio reprehensible, the court cautions: "We must keep the reprehensibility of this case in proper perspective." This is good advice, advice that the Court would have done well to heed rather than merely dispense.
The Court limited the liability for the intentional killing of Trent DiGiurio because the ratio of punitive damages to damages was about 18 to 1, a ratio, as discussed in the earlier post, a result of the deficient and limited remedies available under Kentucky law for wrongful death. The Court noted that a lesser award of damages could permit such a ratio. If punitive damages for an intentional killing are to be so directly linked to the earning power of the person killed, it follows that a jury, according to this ruling, has greater power to punish a person who has killed an older person and one with lesser earning power than a younger person or one with greater earning power. Furthermore, since the case involves the most reprehensible act imaginable -- the intentional killing of another person – it surely does and will, if it stands, provide fodder to limit accountability and liability of wrongdoers in other cases, whose intentional wrongdoing will surely fall short of the degree of reprehensibility of an intentional killing.
The Kentucky Court of Appeals misinterpreted and misapplied the framework established by the United States Supreme Court for analyzing the constitutionality of punitive damage awards. Few families deserve an end to their intersection with the Kentucky judicial system more than the DiGiurios. Nonetheless, it surely must be hoped that the Kentucky Supreme Court will accept this case for review.
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