Those fees are purely subjective as they do vary from court to court and jury to jury.  It is a lotto, but with the states so high, and the down side virtually nil, any people, at the encouragement of ambulance chasers, are willing to play it.  Just look at the latest suit against Catepillar by the Corries.

Others have said that the lotto should go to a third party, and I agree.  Sometimes a penalty against the source is required to ensure they are more careful in the manufacture or delivery of their product.  But that does not mean the injured person should be set on easy street because of it.  Pay them for actual damages.  Leave the lotto to charities.

Welcome aboard again.  And as an FYI:  We have another poster (originally from Canada) living in Japan - her handle is momijiki.  Nice lady.

You will get to know many of the regulars over time, and even the infrequenters.  Overall, a pretty good group.

I think it should go to charities set up specifically against whatever they're being punished for. Like, the McDonald's case should go to a burn victim charity. The cigarette cases should go to a lung cancer charity. And the charity should be chosen by the victim.

in the case of mcdonalds they were told that their coffee was too hot.

but i think the lady putting a hot cup of anything between her legs is asking to be burnt.

You did leave out one thing though. Not only are people suing for a lotto like ending. The companies that are being sued also have the tendency of either settling out of court for a much less but still outrageous for the accident amount or they may not have much of a problem paying the money off and still doing what they were doing wrong cause chances are it will be a while before it happens again and they are probably saving more money doing it than they pay off.

I do like the idea of the extra money going to a charity. But then imagine the charities fighting over who deserves the money more. Oh Lord how I always find a downside to everything don't I?

danielost,

I agree about the McDonald's lady. No excuses there. But at the end of the day we can't fix stupidity, we just have to minimize its damages. And I'm not talking about the stupidity of the lady nearly as much as I am the judges who can't make good just calls on things like these. Some strange cases have their reasons, but it seems that the vast majority of them aren't founded at all. Especially when the profession of lawyers, who would know best the issues, are critical, there is a problem with the courts.

Jythier,

Having the money go to charities designed to help the same cause isn't a bad idea at all. In fact, I'm sure that you could actually find very well established charities for most of the cases. However, I am against the idea that the victim gets to decide. I have no issue if they want to make a suggestion to the judge. But I foresee some issues with corruption of smaller charities, if not even the larger ones. For instance, if a charity needs more money, they might have one of their members create a frivolous lawsuit to get more money. While the "victim" would only get hospital bills etc paid, he/she might then decided that the SITTM (stick it to the man) fee go to their charity. And they might get a a kickback off of it. Or at the very least, their charity gets paid. But this still won't deter abuses as much as it would if it was decided by the judge. Granted, it might open up some on the side of the judge, but he/she can be easily tracked, patterns established, scrutiny applied, audits ran, etc. Having it come from a more central source is easier to track.

Dr. Guy,
Thanks for the warm welcome. Seems like a great forum here. I've enjoy it so far. Look forward to many great discussions.

the latest once i like are the ones sueing becouse mcdonalds or burger king made them fat

you know what i want to sue bill clinton for pretending to be the president