South Florida Injury Lawyer Blog
Drunk driving injuries can be horrific, perhaps the more so because they are always wholly preventable. For this reason, people who have suffered West Palm Beach DUI injuries may be entitled to pursue punitive damages on top of regular (compensatory) damages. This is noteworthy because very few types of Florida injury cases allow punitive damages.
As our Palm Beach injury lawyers can explain, compensatory damages are intended to indemnify a person for specific losses or injuries. It replaces what’s lost (medical bills, lost wages, etc.) or in the case of intangible losses (i.e., emotional distress, pain and suffering, loss of life enjoyment, etc.), it provides some measure of monetary relief. There is no special process to ask for compensatory damages.
Punitive damages are different because they aren’t solely to compensate someone for losses, but rather to penalize the person who caused the damage and/or deter future acts of wrongdoing. You must specifically ask the court to seek punitive damages, and they’re only allowed in certain instances. DUI injury cases are one of those.
This matters because punitive damages can substantially increase the dollar amount of compensation to which you are entitled. While Florida law specifically caps punitive damages at three times the compensatory damages OR up to $500,000 (whichever is higher), DUI damages are specifically exempted from this cap.