Racking Up Texas-Size Verdicts
Dallas Morning News
Sunday, April 1 1, 2004
Associated Press
Are things really bigger in Texas? Well, when it comes to court victories, the state made a good showing. The National Law Journal says 14 of the top 100 plaintiff’s wins in 2003 came in Texas courts.
The biggest award in Texas, $163.8 million, went to the family of a tire repairman killed when the earthmover tire he was repairing exploded. The verdict, the 11th-largest nationwide, was rendered in Beaumont against defendant Trinity Materials.
Calvary Investments LLC won the biggest verdict in Dallas courts when it was awarded $51.3 million from SunStar Acceptance Corp. in a dispute over a portfolio of loans that Calvary wanted to buy from SunStar. The award ranked 36th.
The biggest Tarrant County win, 46th nationally, came in a case in which a teenager in a Correctional Service Corp. facility died of pneumonia. The teen’s family was awarded $40.1 million.
The biggest plaintiffs’ win nationwide was in Alabama, where the loser was Irving-based Exxon Mobil Corp. The state of Alabama won a $11.9 billion verdict against Exxon Mobil in a dispute over royalty payments. Alabama won $3.5 billion in a 2000 trial, but the energy giant persuaded a higher court to send it back for a new trial. This story isn’t over – an Alabama judge reduced a new verdict on March 29, and the company promised to appeal.
The Journal listed defense wins, too, including a Corpus Christi case in which Bayer Corp. fended off lawyers seeking $550 million in damages for about 1,500 users of its cholesterol-busting drug Baycol.
