Gov. John Bel Edwards trounced tort reformers on Friday by vetoing three bills that proponents said would lead to a fairer legal system, lower auto insurance rates and create more accountability for billboard ads that promote “jackpot justice.”
Louisiana Lawsuit Abuse Watch (LLAW) expressed disappointment that the governor used his power to strike down bills that would have reformed civil litigation in the state. Among the bills on the chopping block was SB 418 by Sen. Kirk Talbot (R-River Ridge).
That bill would have lowered the monetary threshold for jury trials in personal injury litigation, reducing it from the current $50,000 to $10,000. Louisiana currently has the largest such threshold in the nation.
SB 418 would have also ended the prohibition against juries being told whether a plaintiff was wearing seat belts in a personal injury trial. The bill’s provisions would have amounted to the most substantial package of legal reforms passed by the legislature in nearly 30 years, according to LLAW’s executive director, Lana Venable.
“In addition to reducing auto insurance rates, these reforms would have brought Louisiana in line with other states and helped insulate taxpayers from the hidden costs of lawsuit abuse – averaging $4,000 per year for every Louisiana family,” Venable said in a statement emailed to the Louisiana Record.
In his veto letter on SB 418, Edwards said that although there were areas where compromise could have been reached, the bill contained no assurance that auto insurance rates would go down.
“I am convinced that if we are truly going to reduce insurance rates, we need to confront all of the underlying factors that lead to high insurance rates, such as distracted driving, poor road and bridge infrastructure, and discriminatory practices based on credit rating and gender that lead to more uninsured and underinsured drivers,” the governor said.
LLAW was also behind SB 395 by Sen. Heather Cloud (R-Turkey Creek), which also was vetoed. It sought to prevent attorneys from putting up misleading billboard ads that make exaggerated claims about how much clients received in judgments, since such ads often fail to figure in lawyer fees, court costs and related expenses that reduce damages awards.
“The legislation would have increased much-needed transparency, as advertisers would have been required to disclose how much was factored in for these fees,” Venable said.
The Pelican Institute, a nonprofit policy research organization, expressed disappointment that Edwards also vetoed HB 313 by Rep. Thomas Pressly (R-Shreveport), which would have limited courts’ ability to impose liability on businesses organizations for practices conducted by groups of related businesses.
Edwards said this elimination of what’s known as the single business enterprise doctrine could have resulted in negative financial consequences for creditors, but the Pelican Institute disagreed.
“(The) bill would have clarified long-standing principles, protected Louisiana’s entrepreneurs from unpredictable abuse of our legal system and rejected judicial activism,” Pelican CEO Daniel Erspamer said in a prepared statement.