Illinois Supreme Court Uncaps Medical Malpractice Damages Again

The Illinois Supreme Court has once again shot down a state law capping non-monetary damages in medical malpractice lawsuits, finding that such a statute violates the separation of powers between the judicial and legislative branches.

The high court said in the Thursday decision that the limit on non-monetary damages, such as those for pain and suffering, interferes with "the authority of the judicial branch to reduce verdicts." While four justices backed the decision, two concurred in part and dissented in part, and one didn't participate.

Health care industry defenders and trial lawyer opponents of the 2005 law squared off in the case, which alleged malpractice against a hospital, doctor and nurse involved in the delivery of a brain-damaged baby. The new law would have capped damages in such cases at $1 million against hospitals and their personnel and $500,000 against individual doctors.

The case, Lebron v. Gottlieb Memorial Hospital, was actually the lead case in a group of lawsuits consolidated in an appeal to the high court from Cook County Circuit Court. The doctor and hospital were able to appeal directly from the trial court to the high court after Judge Diane Joan Larsen in November 2007 ruled on constitutional grounds that the law was illegal. The Illinois Supreme Court had found similar laws unconstitutional in 1997 and in 1976.

Former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson, a Washington partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, and Gary Feinerman, a Chicago partner in Sidley Austin, argued the case on behalf of the doctor and hospital, respectively. Georgetown University Law Center professor Michael Gottesman argued for the plaintiffs with an assist from first chair Robert Peck, who leads the Center for Constitutional Litigation in Washington.

"I would hope that the legislature now, having gone to the well three times in Illinois, would understand that this is a non-starter constitutionally," said Peck, whose center has similar court fights against damage caps pending in 13 other states.

Olson's partner, Andrew Tulumello, who also worked on the case, declined to comment, citing a request from the client.

The Loyola University Health System, to which Gottlieb Memorial Hospital belongs, and the American Tort Reform Association said they were disappointed with the decision. "It's very discouraging that the high court chose to ignore the will of the citizens, as expressed through the reform law crafted by their representatives, the elected branches, and instead came down on the side of the influential personal injury bar," the association said in a statement.

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