Personal injury suits on decline/ Costs, system reforms contribute to

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Dec 30, 2002 | by BILL HETHCOCK

It's an old lawyer joke: Slip and fall, claim a hard-to-detect back injury and sue.

But there are growing indications these types of lawsuits are on the decline.

The number of personal injury and negligence lawsuits filed in El Paso County and statewide decreased sharply in the past 10 years, Colorado judicial branch statistics show.

Some lawyers say the statistics refute the negative image of personal injury attorneys as ambulance-chasing buzzards passing out business cards at accidents.

Other lawyers, legislators and lobbyists say the decline is a sign of a sluggish economy or the byproduct of judicial system reforms.

In El Paso County, personal injury and negligence cases fell 23 percent, from 927 in fiscal year 1992 to 717 in the fiscal year that ended June 30.

Statewide, personal injury and negligence filings fell 14 percent, from 5,909 in 1992 to 5,094 in 2002, judicial branch figures show.

Factoring in population growth, the number of personal injury filings dropped during the decade from 169 to 113 per 100,000 residents in Colorado, according to statistics the Colorado Trial Lawyers Association compiled.

The numbers show Coloradans are less litigious than they were a decade ago, said personal injury lawyer Peter Goldstein, who has practiced in El Paso County for 32 years.

The statistics debunk the argument too many personal injury suits are clogging the courts and driving up health and auto insurance prices, he said.

"There never was a litigation explosion," he said. "It's a figment of the insurance industry's imagination."

State Sen. Andy McElhany, R-Colorado Springs, called the decline in personal injury filings encouraging news. He supported laws to limit lawsuits.

McElhany said he doesn't believe Colorado residents are less litigious.

Instead, he said, the numbers suggest tort reform laws the General Assembly enacted in the late 1980s are working.

Those reforms, passed before McElhany took office, include a $250,000 cap on noneconomic damages in most personal injury cases.

Noneconomic damages include pain and suffering, inconvenience, emotional stress and impairment of quality of life.

The reforms limit punitive damages, or the money assessed to punish an entity or individual.

The reforms improved Colorado's business climate and protected consumers from rising costs because of litigation-related expenses, said Jeff Weist, executive director of the Colorado Civil Justice League, a coalition of businesses, insurers, medical organizations and taxpayers who lobby against lawsuit abuse.

"Because of those farsighted reforms, we're not Mississippi, where class action suits have run amuck, or Nevada, where doctors are fleeing the state because of high premiums for medical malpractice insurance," Weist said.

Fewer than one in 10 personal injury cases filed in Colorado go to trial, suggesting too many filings remain trivial, Weist said.

Many questionable suits are filed in hopes a defendant will settle out of court rather than endure the cost and risk of a trial, he said.

Others are judged frivolous and immediately dismissed.

But the reason most insurance-related cases settle out of court is the insurer realizes the claim is legitimate and should have been paid before a lawsuit was filed, Goldstein said.

Colorado Trial Lawyers Association President Ross Buchanan said the tort reformers' real motive is to escape accountability for corporate corruption, insurance and accounting fraud, price gouging, and manufacture and sale of defective products.

Steven Werner, a Colorado Springs lawyer who handles personal injury cases, said the economic downturn can partially explain the drop in filings.

"The cost of funding a lawsuit is very high," he said. "People just don't have the money."

If an attorney takes a case on contingency - meaning the lawyer's labor is free up front - litigants must pay $10,000 to $15,000 for basic lawsuits and more for complex cases, Werner said. That covers costs such as filing fees and depositions, he said.

For example, a basic case might generate 10 depositions at $750 each, he said.

Even if a litigant wins, the payoff may not be worth the price, Werner said.

When juries award relatively high-dollar verdicts, judges in El Paso County often reduce them, he said.

"Colorado is an extraordinarily conservative state, and the judges in Colorado Springs are very conservative," he said.

"Whenever they get a chance to reduce what a plaintiff is entitled to, they'll knock it down."

FILINGS DECREASE

Fiscal year 2002 breakdown:

El Paso County Across the state

Personal injury 478 2,583

(motor vehicle)

Personal injury (other) 89 758

Negligence 132 1,456

Professional malpractice 18 297

FY 2002 total cases 717 5,094

FY 1992 total cases 927 5,909

10-year change -23 percent -14 percent

SOURCE: State Court Administrator's Office