Should all settlement amounts be public record?

[BigVMan23]

If that is how you feel then maybe you shouldn't be filing suit.

 

And maybe they shouldn't have left a drain cover off of a 4 foot deep hole for someone to step into in their dog walking park and blow out a knee, or fixed the slide my kid goes down at the park that had a sharp screw sticking out of it 2 inches long and ripped a huge gash in my kids leg...or...well you get the picture. Again all hypothetical, but fear of being outed publicly shouldn't be a reason I not sue when I have been wronged or should be fairly compensated.

[theguru]

And maybe they shouldn't have left a drain cover off of a 4 foot deep hole for someone to step into in their dog walking park and blow out a knee, or fixed the slide my kid goes down at the park that had a sharp screw sticking out of it 2 inches long and ripped a huge gash in my kids leg...or...well you get the picture. Again all hypothetical, but fear of being outed publicly shouldn't be a reason I not sue when I have been wronged or should be fairly compensated.

 

If someone or some business did you wrong you shouldn't care what other people think. Ignorance is ignorance.

[theguru]

To answer your question: no, I do not believe settlements should be public record, for several reasons:

 

1. Privacy Issues: Many settlements arise from situations that are embarrassing, damaging, or very personal in nature. For example, consider the Plaintiff that contracts HIV after undergoing an otherwise routine surgery at the local hospital. Plaintiff is otherwise a healthy individual and likely does not want his medical condition to be known, much less publicly available. The settlement agreement could possibly be tailored to avoid including all of the facts at issue, but the fact remains that the settlement would be publicly available and questions would ensue that are not fair to Plaintiff (and to a lesser extent the hospital).

 

2. Each claim, settlement and/or lawsuit is unique, but may arise from similar circumstances. For example, consider a manufacturing defect which injures 10 people on 10 separate occasions across the country. Each of these 10 people may hire a different local attorney to represent them against a manufacturer. The manufacturer would likely hire the same attorney to defend the action (with the assistance of local counsel). Each of these 10 claims are very different although they arise from the same manufacturing defect. If settlements are publicly available, attorneys and insurance adjusters may resort to the “settlement database” to determine the “retail value” of a claim, rather than evaluating the claim on an individual basis. If the 1st Plaintiff settles for $50,000 (and it becomes public record), why can’t each claim settle for the same amount?

 

3. I don't feel that the government should be any more involved than it already is.

 

I fully support the reasons you've cited for making them public record: transparency, truthfulness, accountability, etc. I just don't see how making settlements publicly available would improve those concerns. In the grand scheme of things, only a minority of settlements contain confidentiality clauses prohibiting either side from discussing the details. Any jury verdict is already publicly available and there are publications which monitor, track & analyze those verdicts for the public.

 

We all know no system or way of doing things is perfect, I strongly believe for many reasons that the pros of disclosure outweigh the cons. Problem is, we are in a me me me me me society.