SACRAMENTO — An initiative proposed for the November ballot would curb the abilities of plaintiffs to collect punitive damages in many product-liability cases.
Supporters of the state measure, which include oil giant Chevron Corp. and the business-funded Civil Justice Assn. of California have launched a signature-gathering campaign to put the issue before voters.
If approved, the proposal would bar state courts from assessing punitive damages if a company's product and warning labels had been approved by state or federal regulators. The immunity would be lost only if plaintiffs could prove that a manufacturer, distributor or seller intentionally withheld or misrepresented information specifically required by a government agency.
Punitive damages typically are used by juries in civil cases to penalize the guilty party and send a warning to potential wrongdoers. They can amount to hundreds of millions of dollars and occasionally result in calls for limits on "frivolous" lawsuits and outsized jury awards.
The measure is sounding alarm bells among consumer activists who view punitive damages as an effective way to punish corporate wrongdoing.
"This measure removes a major check on outrageous behavior," said Robert Fellmeth, a former district attorney and executive director of the Center for Public Interest Law at the University of San Diego.
"Somebody could be grossly negligent and escape having to pay punitive damages, provided they didn't deliberately withhold information from any governmental body," said John Nockleby, a law professor and director of the Civil Justice Program at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.
The initiative's supporters said they didn't want to let companies off the hook if they had committed fraud to get a product on the market. But "if you've already gone through some government approval process, why should you get hammered?" said Jack Coffey, Chevron's government affairs manager for California.
The proposal would not affect the victims' right to collect compensatory damages for economic losses or their pain and suffering, Coffey said. "Nobody is talking about anybody who gets hurt not being compensated," he said.
The measure could affect a number of pending cases in California, including suits against Chevron and other companies that produced MTBE, a chemical compound used to reduce auto exhaust emissions.
