Punitive Damages

[Judith71]

Kurt Parrott, a 15-year-old was thrown from his motorcycle in Opelika, Ala. The buckle of his helmet failed, and he died when his bare head hit the pavement. Mr. Parrott’s mother sued the Italian company that made the helmet, and an Alabama court awarded her $1 million.
But the Italian company refused to pay. When the lawyers of the Parrott family tried to collect it in Italy, the Italian Supreme Court blocked them telling that the peculiarity of punitive damages as per American law was so offensive to Italian notions of justice.
The rest of the world views the idea of punitive damages with alarm. As the Italian court explained, private lawsuits brought by injured people should have only one goal, compensation for a loss.
According to foreign courts allowing separate awards meant to punish the defendant is a terrible idea. Punishments should be meted out only by the criminal justice system, with its elaborate due process protections and disinterested prosecutors. It is not fair, they add, to give plaintiffs a windfall beyond what they have lost.
Some common-law countries do allow punitive damages, though in limited circumstances and modest amounts. In the United States, by contrast, enormous punitive awards are relatively common, although they are often reduced or eliminated on appeal.
The U.S. practice of permitting a lay jury to exercise largely discretionary judgment with limited constraints in awarding punitive damages is regarded almost universally outside the U.S. with a high degree of disfavor.
There are signs that the gap between the United States and the rest of the world is narrowing, as American courts and legislatures start to limit punitive awards and other countries start to experiment with them.
Kurt Parrott’s mother, learned about the Italian Supreme Court’s decision from Dick Weekley who is active in community affair. Her lawyers had turned the matter over to an international collection agency and had not bothered to tell her that she had lost.
Questions about punitive damages seemed academic to her, if not heartless. She said pensively, “A million-dollar award is really not enough to punish any large company in this day and age, and it certainly does not bring back Kurt.”

[ursula]

The People's Imperial Kleptocracy of Dumfukistan (once known as U.S.A.) is so far out of the cycle that it is terrifying.

As an economic entity it has been officially bankrupt since 1985.
The Dumfuki$tani Dolor is useless and the continuing violence committed to maintain it as a basis for pricing products and most services within the petro-chemical industries of this planet are 100% unsustainable.

I could go on...

Why bother ?

p.s. Do investigate what is meant by 'private placement instruments'...
This search will aid you in discovering a part of the reason why the People's Imperial Kleptocracy of Dumfukistan has created a debt structure that will never be covered.
The disUnited Kingdom is absolutely ditto.

The scum heroes that the indigenous Dumfukistanis are trained and compelled to worship and believe (by imported Aussie sh¡t) are the very ones who are completing the rip-off...

You may also wish to check out the stats re: % of population engaged in agriculture between the years 1963-1965 and 1982-present.
If you do so, perhaps you'll get back to me and let me know where those people are now and what the survivors may be doing.

Awww... Can't resist it.... I'd also like to know where the Ford Motor Company actually assembles automobiles inside Dumfukistan.

oooh... So the totally honest senator from Ill-In-Noise is gonna get rid of AIPAC, heh ?

Wanna bet ?

Anybody out there who can tell me how anyone who actually becomes a Dumfukistani senator can be clean, unrented and without liens ? I guess maybe Arnie knows.






btw...
Kurt did NOT die because any helmet buckle 'failed'.
Kurt died because someone, Kurt or another, did something stupid.
'Accidents' are things such as tornadoes or hurricanes or floods or lightning strikes or volcanic eruptions or...
You get the point.
ALL of the rest is because people screw up and do stupid things.