Personal Injury Law

Republicans and Democrats and Jury Awards: Does Party Affiliation Matter?

Wisconsin Lawyer (via Overlawyered via JuryVox) has an interesting article on the impact a juror?s political bent has on the amount of damages awarded in personal injury cases.

The study contained 476 mock jurors who identified themselves as either Democrats or Republicans. The jurors participated in mock trials for cases involving a personal injury, product liability, or medical malpractice and were divided into four basic categories of damages, which were determined based on how much they actually awarded during a mock trial: no damages, low damages, medium damages, and high damages.

The results indicated that being a self described Republican or Democrat was not predictive of the damage award. In fact, 22.3 percent of self-described Democrats awarded no money damages, while 20.8 percent of self-described Republicans awarded no money.

Does this mean Plaintiffs? personal injury lawyers should ignore information, assuming the lawyers have access, about a juror?s party affiliation? No. In spite of this broad finding indicating that there are no differences between Democrats and Republicans, even the study does not suggest that party affiliation is not a variable to consider. Moreover, the study found that many stereotypical Republican attitudes from jurors do lead to lower verdicts. But the study highlights that nuanced personal views are more helpful in projecting damage awards than mere party affiliation.

Full post as published by Maryland Injury Lawyer Blog on December 15, 2008 (boomark / email).