This has got to be one of the most absurd lawsuits I have read of. I almost don't even see how businesses can operate in this legal environment. This is just crazy. Even if they finally get this overturned on appeal, how much money will they have spent on all those lawyers? These types of insane court rulings can drive large businesses to the edge of bankruptcy, and I have no doubt are also going to increase consumer costs for everyone else, since businesses will have to raise their prices to take the risk of legal liability into consideration. It will pretty much be like a tax on everyone to pay for these ridiculous payouts and all the lawyers. A business has been ordered to pay $7 billion to family of victim murdered by one of their employees. In fact, the employee was off-duty at the time. This employee who committed the murder should be seen as the one responsible for this, not the business! Cable company ordered to pay $7 billion to family of Texas woman murdered by repairman Texas jury has ordered Charter Communications to pay $7 billion in punitive damages to the family of an 83-year-old grandmother robbed and murdered by a cable repairman who arrived in the company’s van while off the clock. Charter was also deemed responsible the previous month for $337.5 million in compensatory damages for the December 2019 of Betty Jo McClain Thomas. The company was accused of "negligence". In other words, supposedly they should have foreseen that one of their employees might murder someone, and then should have taken action to stop it. Negligence cases like Thomas' rarely go to trial, and usually settle out of court. Roy James Holden pleaded guilty to Thomas's murder and was sentenced to life in prison. Thomas' attorneys said that Holden had lied about his past jobs and Charter hadn't verified his employment. Had the company done so and discovered the lie, he would have been disqualified from being hired. Charter cable must pay $7 billion for woman killed by cable repairman (usatoday.com), Amritpal Kaur Sandhu-Longoria, July 28, 2022
When you see rulings like this, you can understand why companies are often frightened into paying settlements, even when the company believes they shouldn't have to. Even if a company believes they probably will not lose the case, they can still be frightened into paying out a settlement, if they think there's any significant probability that they might lose. Just like a criminal defendant pleading guilty does not necessarily mean they are actually guilty, so too a company voluntarily paying out a large amount of money in a settlement to someone suing them does not necessarily mean that company was actually at fault.
