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Households in South Carolina are paying $3,181 annually on a “lawsuit tax,” according to a new report urging reform of the Palmetto State’s badly broken civil justice system.
Released earlier this month by Palmetto Promise – a Columbia, S.C.-based conservative advocacy organization – the report termed this annual tax a “shakedown” by the powerful trial lawyer lobby.
“South Carolina’s lawsuit industry is out of control,” the report (.pdf) noted. “Plaintiff attorneys benefit from outrageous damage awards while bars close and job-creators are alarmed. This phenomenon was on national display in Netflix’s Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal where a convenience store owner was unfairly and relentlessly targeted by plaintiff attorneys because alcohol was involved.”
That’s a reference to this case…
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According to the report, South Carolina’s problem “goes deeper than a few one-off traffic accidents and slips and falls” – citing the Palmetto State’s recent reemergence on a list of “judicial hellholes” as evidence.
The report also specifically referenced controversial asbestos industry judgments as being part of “trial lawyer-led shakedowns (which) have become all too common in South Carolina.”
“Our state has become famous for outrageous awards, including $32 million for secondhand asbestos exposure,” it noted. “Judges here have even increased awards and have acted as a ‘thirteenth juror,’ driving up damages even further. In a related issue, in 2023, businesses began to shut down due to rising insurance premiums caused in part by government policy.”
These asbestos rulings were citied by S.C. attorney general Alan Wilson in a guest column which ran on our site last week.
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RELATED | JUDICIAL CLIMATE REQUIRES ACCOUNTABILITY
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What should state leaders do about the problem? According to Palmetto Promise, unfair and excessive judgments are “not injustices that South Carolina citizens and businesses must simply bear.”
“The General Assembly has the power to change the unjust laws around civil justice and stop the lawsuit industry shakedown,” the report noted.
Specifically, it urges state lawmakers to follow the lead of Florida, Tennessee and other regional competitors by amending the state’s anti-competitive code of laws as follows:
- Remove the alcohol exception in current law or define it properly. In its current form, the statute distorts liability.
- Allow non-party defendants (tortfeasors) to be placed on the jury verdict form for fault allocation.
- Do away with joint and several liability completely (Florida, 2006; 2023). That action enabled that state to adopt jury forms that allow defendants to pay only the percentage of fault for which they are liable. Within the southeast, other states have rejected joint and several liability and have moved toward pure several liability (Tennessee, 2021).
- Also, like Florida (Fl. Stat. § 768.0427), prevent medical damages inflation in personal injury suits by limiting evidence to prove damages attributable to medical treatment or services to amounts that are fairly determined based on specific methods for calculating medical damages.
- Allow failure to use a seatbelt or wear a helmet (in a motorcycle accident) to be admissible in court. Whether injuries by the plaintiff could have been avoided or lessened if the plaintiff had worn a seatbelt is relevant to the mitigation of damages.”
My media outlet has consistently called on lawmakers to fix our badly broken court system… civilly and criminally.
Regular members of FITSNews’ audience are well aware of the pernicious influence lawyer-legislators wield over the state’s supposedly “independent” judiciary – and the limited success reformers have had in fixing this rigged system.
“Trial lawyers are killing competitiveness – and jobs – in South Carolina,” I noted back in December.
Our audience is also well aware of the extent to which ostensibly “Republican” lawmakers have installed far left Democrats to key positions within the judiciary – including former S.C. chief justices Jean Toal and Donald Beatty.
This stuff is not complicated, people. Lawmakers need to remove unfair statutory language… and judges who are in the pocket of the trial lawyer lobby.
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THE REPORT…
(Palmetto Promise)
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.
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4 comments
Fantastic article clearly stating the obvious problem in our state. It’s past time for common sense legislation and I hope this year is the year for the much needed change.
What a crock of bull****, this story is nothing but woke globalist insurance company nonsense.
Injury victims aren’t the problem, it’s giant insurance companies who have bought and paid for “establishment” republicans for decades. We passed all of this in 2005 under Mark Sanford with the promise that it would lower insurance premiums. It utterly failed to make a difference because big insurance pocketed the savings and funded DEI rather than returning the money to the people.
There is not a single requirement in any legislation proposed that actually requires insurance companies to lower premiums or help small business. Wake up FITSNEWS! The establishment is fooling you!
The people are getting screwed by insurance companies and they don’t need more insurance welfare bills. I can’t believe the people fall for this crap. Also once they come for your 7th Amendment rights the 2nd Amendment is not far behind. I’ll keep my guns and my right to a jury trial thank you very much.
Did you know that the proposed legislation allows insurance companies to carelessly mishandle claims with total immunity? Your article didn’t mention the “10 Month Rule”! What is the 10 month rule? It’s a provision in s 244 that allows an insurance company to ignore your claim for 10 months with total immunity. So a tree falls on your car, you call your insurance company and they ignore you for months and months. What can you about it? Nothing under the proposed legislation.
It’s hard enough to hold Allstate, State Farm, and Progressive accountable. Why is the insurance industry special? Our government should not pick winners and losers in the market place, but provide an open and transparent court system where all have a chance to prove their case to a jury without limitation. The right to a jury trial is fundamental to our freedom and the basis for our bill of rights.
Read the legislation ladies and gentlemen, don’t just swallow the talking points. This is bad bad bad, it’s does nothing for S.C., victims, small business etc… throw 244 in the trash and focus on a real bill that helps bars and restaurants (who need help) and doesn’t line the pockets of giant insurance lobby.
President Trump called to the 2023 Florida bill referenced in this article as “the biggest insurance scam in US History” Truth Social 2023. He was right, heed his warning.
All of the backdoor spying will not stop the focus of bright spot lights being shined upon the cockroaches in SC’s court system, either. The past has caught up.
If insurance companies did their jobs, there would be no ambulance chasing lawyers. If ambulance chasers did their jobs, there would be no frivolous lawsuits.
Gee– such a wonderful bunch as a whole.