(A series of recent United States Supreme Court decisions have defined the standard for imposition of punitive damages.)
the “reprehensibility” factor described by the United States Supreme Court in BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559, 134 L. Ed. 2d 809, 116 S. Ct. 1589 (1996). There, the Supreme Court stated that the defendant’s misconduct is “perhaps the most important indicium of the reasonableness of a punitive damages award.” … Repeated “trickery and deceit” targeted at people who are “financially vulnerable” is especially reprehensible and worthy of greater sanctions. … Moreover, “deliberate false statements, acts of affirmative misconduct, or concealment of evidence of improper motive” also warrant larger awards. …
In State Farm Mutual Insurance Company v. Campbell, 538 U.S. 408 (2003), the Supreme Court applied the guidepost it had previously established in BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559 (1996). The Gore decision directed appellate courts reviewing punitive damages awards to consider the following three factors: (1) the degree of reprehensibility of the defendant’s misconduct; (2) the relationship between the actual and potential harm suffered by the plaintiff and the punitive damages award; and (3) the difference between the punitive damages awarded by the jury and the civil penalties authorized or imposed in comparable cases.
In State Farm, the Supreme Court emphasized that, of the three Gore factors, the single most important indicator of the reasonableness of the punitive damage award is the degree of reprehensibility of the defendant’s conduct. The Supreme Court then applied the five factors it had previously set forth in Gore to measure the reprehensibility of the defendant’s conduct: whether the harm was physical or economic; whether the tortuous conduct evinced an indifference to or reckless disregard for the health or safety of others; whether the conduct involved repeated actions or was an isolated incident; and whether the harm resulted from intentional malice, trickery, or deceit, or mere accident.
The United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Phillip Morris v. Williams, Number 05-1256, on October 31, 2006. In Phillip Morris, the Supreme Court will, for the first time, be asked to apply the Gore guideposts to a case involving the death of a plaintiff – a long time smoker who died of lung cancer – rather than a case of merely economic damages. In Phillip Morris, the Oregon Supreme Court upheld the punitive damage award to the family of a deceased smoker more than one hundred times the amount of actual damages. Phillip Morris’ appeal presents two questions to the court: (1) whether, in reviewing a jury’s award of punitive damages, an appellate court’s conclusion that a defendant’s conduct was highly reprehensible and analogous to crime can override the Constitution’s requirement that punitive damages be reasonably related to the harm to the plaintiff; and (2) whether due process permits a jury to punish the defendant for the effect of its conduct on non-parties.
Fraud: In law, the deliberate misrepresentation of fact for the purpose of depriving someone of a valuable possession or legal right. Any omission or concealment that is injurious to another or that allows a person to take unconscionable advantage of another may constitute criminal fraud. The most common type of fraud is the obtaining of property by giving a check for which there are insufficient funds in the signer’s account. Another is the assumption of someone else’s or a fictitious identity with the intent to deceive. Also important are mail and wire fraud (fraud committed by use of the postal service or electronic devices, such as telephones or computers). A tort action based on fraud is sometimes referred to as an action of deceit.
Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/fraud#ixzz1eCv3Afa8