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Frequently Used Terms

Legal Term Definition
APPEAL BOND The amount of the filing fee paid to the appellate court in order to pursue an appeal.
CERTIORARI Most commonly used to refer to the U.S. Supreme Court, which uses a writ of certiorari as a discretionary device to choose the cases it wishes to hear.
CLASS CERTIFICATION The formal determination by a judge that a lawsuit satisfies specified requirements for, and can proceed to trial as, a class action. In the most common form of class action, the judge determines that (1) consumer issues predominate over individual issues, (2) the class action is superior to individual cases, and (3) the class action is manageable, despite the various issues.
COMPARATIVE NEGLIGENCE Under comparative-negligence statutes or doctrines, negligence is measured in terms of a percentage, and awarded damages are diminished by the percent of negligence attributable to the person for whose injury, damage or death recovery is sought.
COMPENSATORY DAMAGES Money that will compensate the prevailing party for the injury sustained if liability is proved. Compensatory damages is designed to restore the injured party to the position that he/she was in prior to the injury.
FINAL JUDGMENT The final order issued by a judge. A final judgment must be entered before the appellate process is allowed to proceed.
PUNITIVE (EXEMPLARY) DAMAGES Damages awarded to the plaintiff over and above the amount determined that will compensate him/her for injury. Punitive damages are awarded when the wrong done to the plaintiff was aggravated by circumstances of violence, oppression, malice, fraud, wanton or wicked conduct on the part of the defendant, to bring solace to the plaintiff's state of mind, and to punish the defendant and to make an example of the defendant. In State Farm v. Campbell, the U.S. Supreme Court stated the following:
"In awarding punitive damages, courts must ensure that the measure of punishment is both reasonable and proportionate to the amount of harm to the plaintiff and to the general damages recovered.

"This Court has instructed courts reviewing punitive damages to consider (1) the degree of reprehensibility of the defendant's misconduct, (2) the disparity between the actual or potential harm suffered by the plaintiff and the punitive damages award, and (3) the difference between the punitive damages awarded by the jury and the civil penalties authorized or imposed in comparable cases."
REMOTENESS Lack of a close connection between an action and an injury, which prevents the party injured from claiming compensation from the party whose "act" was too remote.
SUPERSEDEAS BOND An amount of money governed by the law of the relevant jurisdiction, which is generally set at the amount of damages plus some measure of statutory interest and modified at the discretion of the appropriate court or subject to a cap set by court or statute. The posting of such a bond protects the losing party from paying any damages until all appellate avenues have been exhausted.
THEORIES OF RECOVERY Plaintiffs seek recovery on a variety of legal theories, including negligence, strict liability in tort, design defect, special duty, voluntary undertaking, breach of warranty, failure to warn, fraud, misrepresentation, unfair trade practices, conspiracy, unjust enrichment, medical monitoring, public nuisance, and violations of state and federal antitrust and RICO laws. In certain cases, the plaintiffs claim that cigarette smoking exacerbated injuries caused by exposure to asbestos.

The plaintiffs also seek various forms of relief, including compensatory and punitive damages, treble or multiple damages, statutory damages and penalties, creation of medical monitoring and smoking cessation funds, disgorgement of profits, and injunctive and other equitable relief. Although pleaded damages often are not determinable from a complaint, and the law governing the pleading and calculation of damages varies from state-to-state and jurisdiction-to-jurisdiction, compensatory and punitive damages have been specifically pleaded in a number of cases. These damages have sometimes ranged in amounts from hundreds of millions to even billions of dollars.