On Fri, 04 Mar 2005 18:40:15 -0500, Daniel J. Stern wrote:

> I find myself conflicted over this verdict. My first and strongest
> reaction:
>
> I applaud whenever idiots eject themselves from the gene pool, and that's
> what happened here. The driver was drunk and speeding, the passengers were
> dumb enough to have gotten into a drunk-driven car and dumb enough not to
> wear their seat belts, so their deaths were their own stupid fault. It's
> bad precedent to make an automaker pay for deaths that result from the
> vehicle occupants failing to use their seatbelts.
>
> On the other hand, Ford has a long and shameful history of shoddy,
> least-possible-cost safety engineering for the North American market, and
> they have proven to be very resistant to changing this policy. Perhaps if
> enough verdicts like this are made to stick, their beancounters will
> arrive at the radical notion that it makes good business sense to build
> the damn things properly in the first place.

Well said.

I think what should happen is that punitive damages should be paid to
charitable organizations instead of to the plaintiff. Thus the companies
would still have to pay, the plaintiffs would have less incentive for
frivolous lawsuits and the charitable organizations could use the money.

Also it should be illegal for lawyers to reap a percentage of a settlement
like this, they should only be entitled to compensation on a hourly basis
(their hourly rates are generous enough), which further would cut down on
the number of frivolous lawsuits.

Furthermore they should create a new type of verdict, where the plaintiff
is found at fault and gets nothing but the manufacturer still has to pay
punitive damages to the charitable organization if there was a defect in
his product.

Chris