Punitive damages are not awarded that often in tort cases. When they are, it’s usually because the defendant’s conduct is viewed as being so bad that the court believes it is necessary to punish the defendant in addition to any actual damages that are awarded to the plaintiff. But, what if the defendant dies before the court action is concluded. Should punitive damages still be awarded? If the purpose of granting them is to punish the offender, death of the offender would seem to eliminate the purpose of punitive damages.
In this case, a property owner asked his neighbor permission to enter his property to remove a tree that had fallen across a creek on the neighbor’s property. The property owner was concerned that the tree would create a dam and cause water to back up onto his property. The neighbor had some reservations, but eventually allowed the property owner to remove the fallen tree. The neighbor left for a hunting trip to Colorado and the property owner and a friend entered the property and removed the fallen tree… and forty other live trees along the creek. Understandably, the neighbor was upset to learn of his uprooted trees when he returned. Before he could remedy the situation, the property owner passed away. A few months later, the neighbor filed a claim in probate seeking damages for the decrease in the value of his property, the lost value of the trees, the expense of restoring the trees, and punitive damages.
The trial court awarded the neighbor $57.50 per tree removed from the property- totaling $2300. However, the trial court refused to award punitive damages, stating that the law in Iowa clearly does not allow punitive damages to be awarded against the estate of a tortfeasor.
The neighbor appealed with little success. The Iowa Supreme Court reaffirmed a long-established legal principle that recovery of punitive damages is barred when the tortfeasor dies before the judgment. The court went on to opine that punitive damages are meant to punish a person who “wickedly and wantonly violated the rights of another.” But, that can’t happen once the tortfeasor dies. Thus, the court stated, “civil law never inflicts vicarious punishment.”
According to Iowa Code §611.20 (Iowa’s survival statute), all legal actions shall survive and may be brought notwithstanding the death of the person entitled or liable. The neighbor argued for a strict interpretation of the statute. If the property owner was still living, he likely would have been awarded punitive damages. While that may have been true, and legal actions do survive death of a party, that didn’t mean that punitive damages could be awarded post-death. The appellate court did not agree, referencing an 1884 case for that proposition. Since that time, the legislature never amended Iowa’s survival statute to include language specifically allowing punitive damages against a tortfeasor’s estate.
Another statute, Iowa Code §668A, allows a court to award the full amount of punitive damages if the plaintiff can prove the defendant specifically directed his tortious actions at the plaintiff. The neighbor argued that §668A is silent as to what happens after the tortfeasor’s death. The court rejected this argument with the same response. The legislature had knowledge of the case law precedent and never spoke on the issue.
Finally, the neighbor attempted to make a policy argument. Citing several cases where punitive damages have been awarded by the courts to deter tortious acts, he argued that allowing recovery from a torfeasor’s estate would advance the general deterrence theory behind punitive damages. The appellate court quickly dismissed the policy argument stating that the argument was not persuasive enough to reconsider precedent and punitive damages do not deter someone who is no longer living.
One Iowa Supreme Court Justice dissented, here, urging the court to adopt the minority rule allowing the award of punitive damages against the estate of a wrongdoer. The dissenting judge rejected the idea that long-standing legal principle should not have been disturbed because of concerns over the stability of the law. According to the dissent, the court could have avoided a “clearly erroneous result” in this case by adopting a rule punishing pre-death misconduct. Additionally, the dissenting judge argued pre-death choices always affect beneficiaries, even if they are innocent. In re Estate of Vajgrt, No. 10-1088 (Iowa Sup. Ct. Aug. 5, 2011)