There are two kinds of damages in personal injury cases – economic and non-economic. Economic damages are those that can be easily quantified, such as lost wages or the damage to an automobile after an accident. Non-economic damages are a bit different – and a very important part of personal injury law in Florida.

Why are non-economic damages so important in a case?

To answer this question, we asked Eric Block, a Florida personal injury lawyer whose practice concentrates on personal injury claims and trial work related to those claims. Here’s what he told us in a recent interview:

Non-economic damages are important because they comprise seven different categories including pain and suffering, mental anguish, loss of the enjoyment of life, inconvenience, disability, physical impairment and aggravation of a preexisting condition.

The jury will determine each of those categories of loss individually based on the greater weight of the evidence. So, you can easily see that if someone who’s been injured in a car accident, a slip-and-fall or by some other negligence has suffered each one of those seven categories of loss.

For example, let’s say that a jury decides that a person should get $10,000 a year. While that doesn’t sound like a whole lot of money; if you add it up for each one of those categories, that’s now $70,000 a year. Further, if the person has a life expectancy of 30 or 40 years, you’re in the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars by simply doing the math. So, those damages can be very, very valuable, but again, a jury has to believe that the plaintiff is legitimately hurt and legitimately suffers those damages.

No limits

Block told us that, in the State of Florida, there is no cap on damages other than what is proven by the greater weight of the evidence. In fact, he said that juries sometimes award more than what has been requested. He provided the following example from a recent case:

I’m getting ready to try a case where I had asked the jury to award $200,000 in future medical bills to my client. We put on evidence that supported our claim that my client would require $200,000 in medical procedures over the remainder of his life. Well, the jury came back in its verdict and gave us $500,000 in future medical bills and the judge threw it out ruling that there was no basis for the jury to give us $500,000 – that there was only a basis for the $200,000.

While we certainly didn’t like that, the fact is that we are getting ready to try the case again. Since then, my client has had two more surgeries and we think his claim is quite a bit more valuable. So, what initially was a bad ruling by the judge may actually be a blessing in disguise.

If you’ve been injured due to the negligence of another, contact a Florida injury attorney to discuss your situation. The consultation is free, without obligation and strictly confidential.