Consumers for Civil Justice - Number of Federal Tort Trials Fell by Almost 80 Percent from 1985 through 2003

Number of Federal Tort Trials Fell by Almost 80 Percent from 1985 through 2003

The number of tort trials concluded in U.S. district courts declined by nearly 80 percent – from 3,600 trials in 1985 to fewer than 800 trials in 2003, the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. Approximately nine out of 10 tort trials involved personal injury issues – most frequently, product liability, motor vehicle (accident), marine and medical malpractice cases. The percentage of tort cases concluded by trial in U.S. district courts has also declined from 10 percent in the early 1970s to 2 percent in 2003.

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Total payments for malpractice judgments have fallen 24.5 percent, from $299.6 million in 2000 to $226.2 million in 2004.
The median payment resulting from a judgment appears to have risen, from $230,000 in 2000 to $265,000 in 2004.
The total number of judgments against physicians dropped 31.9 percent between 2000 and 2004, from 670 to 456.
The number of malpractice judgments against physicians, adjusted for population growth, has fallen 34.6 percent since 2000.