You’ll Never Hear This in Court
Who pays the verdict in a personal injury case? Is it the defendant? Is it the defendant’s insurance company, Allstate, State Farm, Farmers, American Family, GEICO, Progressive? Or is it the insurance company paying a portion and the defendant, who is on the hook, and will lose personal assets? The answer, the insurance company pays the entire amount, not the Defendant.
What I am going to tell you about who pays in a personal injury case is something that every insurance company in America does not want the jury to hear. In fact, they do not want a jury to openly discuss at trial who pays. Insurance is a fact of life in the United States of America. Each of us pays for insurance. We pay for insurance for our cars, for our homes, health insurance for life insurance and we pay insurance for virtually every product that we purchase. For instance, when we buy a lift ticket to go skiing, of course, there is factored in an amount for insurance for the ski area. When we buy drugs at the pharmacy for sickness, of course there is a cost of insurance factored into the cost for bad drugs. A first thought is well the lawyers have caused this particular circumstance. A closer look may suggest the lawyers that file claims against negligent defendants are the insurance company’s biggest friend. While the insurance companies say that lawyers are bad and American businesses say that lawyers are bad, the fact is that enormous premiums are paid to the insurance companies. Certainly, that money is not all paid back to injured victims across the United States. In fact, a very small amount is ever given back. Insurance companies do not want a jury ever discussing where the money comes from in a personal injury case.
Where does the money come from in the personal injury case? It doesn’t come from the defendant. It comes from the insurance company. The jury is only told in a very limited fashion that there is insurance at all. During the jury selection process which is called voir dire, there is a singular question that either the judge asks or the plaintiff’s attorney is allowed to ask and that is, “Are any of the prospective jurors insured by, agents of, principles of, i.e. the State Farm, American Family, or GEICO Insurance Company.” If anything else is asked about insurance by the lawyer or any reference made to the defendant’s insurance company during the course of the trial, a mistrial can be declared and the injured person is thrown out of court.
So who pays? If a case goes to trial, the insurance company pays the full amount. I have tried numerous cases where on Friday afternoon after significant trial there is award made in the State of Colorado for $25,000.00, $50,000.00 or $100,000.00 from the jury. After a while, it becomes predictable. Why is it that it becomes predictable? Juries are instructed not to do investigation on their own, they cannot take into account evidence that has not been submitted at trial or use sympathy during their deliberations as a factor. The jurors go home and look to their own insurance policies on their cars and see $25,000.00, $50,000.00 or $100,000.00. Jurors worry about what the effect of their decision will be on both parties, both the plaintiff – the injured person and the defendant – who was the negligent party. It is obvious in many trials that a jury does not want to unduly punish the negligent person. The jury does not want a negligent person to lose their house, a house that they may have worked for forever. A jury may take into account that the defendant is a good person but a negligent person and does not want to render a verdict that will affect them for the rest of their lives or affect their children or force them into bankruptcy. But the jury does not know that during the course of their thought process regarding saddling a particular defendant with a substantially higher verdict for a terribly injured person, that the defendant will never be the party that is paying the cost of the verdict. A Defendant’s policy limits of insurance do not come into play when the insurance company refuses to pay prior to the trial. Juries are never informed what the policy limits are for a defendant. Under our system, the jury is never informed whether a person has $25,000.00 in policy coverage or $5,000,000.00. The insurance company not the Defendant pays the full amount of the jury’s verdict.
Why don’t the insurance companies want you to know? The truth is they won’t have to pay as much if the citizens sitting on juries know where there money is coming from. The last thing they want you to know is where the money is coming from. If you ever have any questions about this at any time, please do not hesitate to contact me.
David S. Hoover.
