TBA Law Blog

TBA Law Blog

Supreme Court Clarifies Standard for Reduction of Jury Verdict

Posted by: Katharine Heriges on Oct 20, 2017
The Tennessee Supreme Court has clarified when and how both trial and appeals courts can reduce jury verdicts. A Memphis truck driver was awarded $3.7 million in damages by a jury in a case, but the trial court reduced the amount of the jury’s award (called a “remittitur”) to $2.1 million. The court of appeals affirmed part of the trial court’s remittitur of the jury’s award and reversed other parts of it. In addition, it also reduced the damages for “loss of enjoyment of life” even further, from $400,000 down to $50,000. The Supreme Court held that an appellate court may order its own remittitur of a jury’s damage award, even if the trial court has already reduced the award, but the appellate court may do so only if the award as reduced by the trial court “exceeds the uppermost boundary of the range of reasonableness,” i.e., is not supported by material evidence. The court of appeals did not follow this standard, and the Supreme Court reversed its remittitur of the jury’s award for loss of enjoyment of life.   

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