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Some plaintiffs that have filed a personal injury claim against the party responsible for a given accident welcome any hint that the same defendant might be hit with punitive damages. Such claimants should know that the legal community has another name for the money demanded of certain defendants. It is referred to as exemplary damage.
The legal community uses that alternate name because the demands that can supplement a request for compensatory damages serve as a type of example. Each of them displays that sort of action that the court feels willing to take against someone that has performed some form of egregious behavior.
Features normally associated with such behavior
It causes a good deal of harm to others. It tends to be reckless and careless. A driver that makes a habit of tailgating cars stands as a perfect example of such behavior. It shows the guilty party’s disregard for the law. A speeding driver has chosen to carry out an egregious act. So has a driver that runs through a red light.
It suggests a disregard for others. The defendant displays that disregard by performing an intentional act, one that violates the norms of behavior. It may involve commission of a fraudulent act. In other words, the defendant uses deceit in an effort to hide his or her careless or wanton actions.
When and how punitive damages get awarded to a plaintiff
The court hands out such an award in cases where a plaintiff has filed a personal injury claim. If the defendant’s actions have caused an especially harmful injury, the court could feel compelled to supplement the compensatory damages with exemplary ones.
Personal Injury Lawyer in Hamilton knows that the exemplary damages do not replace the money that will compensate the victim. Instead, that example of the court’s distain for the defendant’s actions serves as a supplement to any demand for compensatory damages.
In some states, the law has placed a limit on the amount of money that can be asked of a defendant that has behaved in an egregious manner. Still, the law has not established any sort of formula for calculating the value of a defendant’s punitive damages. In other words, that award does not have to correspond to the requested compensation in any specific fashion.
By the same token, the law has not set a minimum for the amount that might be demanded of a defendant. A jury does not always grant such as award. Moreover, if it does elect to hit a defendant with an added demand for money, it can ask for just a small amount of cash. A jury might take advantage of that freedom, if a criminal has accused a police officer with inflicting a personal injury.