Plaintiffs Rejecting Settlement Offers Fare Worse at Trial

While not exclusively related to mass torts, the ABA reports on the results of a new study of civil suits from 2000-2005, which found that 61% of plaintiffs rejecting settlement offers fared worse at trial. Here’s a link to the New York Times story and an excerpt of the ABA story:

Sixty-one percent of plaintiffs who turned down settlement offers ended up faring worse at trial, according to a New York Times story on the study. The average settlement offer was $48,700 and the average award at trial was $43,000, a difference of $5,700.

Defendants were wrong in just 24 percent of the cases, but for them the cost of a bad gamble was must larger. The average plaintiff’s settlement demand in those cases was $770,900 and the average verdict was $1.9 million, a difference of more than $1.1 million.

ECB