Posted On: July 5, 2007, 3:25 pm CDT

Posted By: Jeff

This thread is very frustrating and has outlined a staple of the comments on this site...personal responsibility.

There are a wealth of people that make comments on this site about personal res. for individuals, but seem not to care when companies do not demonstrate the same. This case has absolutely nothing to do with the pers. respons. of the drunk driver of the car. Of course, he is 100% at fault for the injuries sustained by the victim / plaintiff. That is not in dispute. The problem is that instead of offering a limits settlement, the insurance company decided to play a little game by hoping that under some extraordinary circumstances, they wouldn't have to pay the limits. They acted in bad faith as it was apparent the limits settlement was appropriate. They did not demonstrate the PERSONAL RESPONSBILITY they should have in being the insurer on the account.

This is not to say that if there is some dispute about coverages that the insurance company does not have every right to challenge. Say, a dispute about whether the policy was in force, or whether there was an exclusion that applied, etc. then Princeton should have challenged. But as this is not the case, they rolled the dice and lost at the expense of virtually all involved.

As a side note, I think many of you are confused about the purpose of punitive damages. Punitive damages are intended to punish / deter the individual or company from doing this practice in the future. That is why you will see heavy penalties. Punitive damages do not necesarily need to be somehow monetarily commensurate with the infraction. They are designed to send a message. If you were personally involved in a case and were penalized 10,000, that might make you think twice before you did it again. However, when dealing with a company, the penalty has to be much higher or it is simply a cost of doing business. The intent is that the next time this happens to Princeton, they will do the right thing and make the offer, and that's why it is so high. Hopefully, next time they will.