Gee, I wonder who you voted for. How is that Hopey Changey thing working out for you? Bush had his faults allright and lost his spine for the last 2 years of his Presidency to his discredit. Nancy Pelosi & Harry Reid ran roughshod over him and he signed every spending bill sent his way. No wonder the Republicans were turned away along with having the worst candidate in McCain possible. Progressives in both parties are responsible for this mess and that will be rectified in November.
problem is that everyone wants to blame somone else, including the presidency. in fact, it’s not the president who caused this. it’s the folks that don’t want to take responsibility. juries think that even if a company is wrong, they have deep pockets and can pay anything.
we have companies that are going bankrupt because of these ridiculous payouts, that we can’t keep business alfoat to hire folks. our unemployment is going down and will continue to go down.
Texas Watcher
1. I would invite Bush to my group.
2. He served. I will not stand to let you disparage his service i nthe National Guard. I bet you didnt serve. I bet allllllll that money you didnt. However, I served in combat in Iraq.and I am in the National Guard.
3. Bush is FOR immigration ‘reform’. I disagree with him on this point, but gets your facts correct.
4. They made a shoody home. Its what you get when you employ these unskilled labors. Require skill to work and see who shows up to work that day. Thats how you fix the system.
5. I do take issue with Perry Homes arbitrating and then losing and saying the couple waived. By participation, I think it would be binding? Perhaps it may have been the letter of the law. Yet, it is very shady. I hope the couple gets a new house. 58 million is ridiculous and they will never see close to that amount but its what it takes to send a message. I bet a few more home makers proceed with caution when they are at fualt.
Why was this claim worth a penny more than the perceived/actual decrease in market value, if even that?
If I sued over a perceived market value loss of $150,000 and got an $800,000 award from an arbiter, I’d be dancing in the streets naked with a handle of whiskey in celebration. But instead this family rejects the award and goes to court…then wins, $56 million (about 375 times as much as the drop in market value leading to the suit)???
Is it any wonder why the insurance market has been so squirrely about Construction Defects and exclusions etc? The quality of construction has gone down in this country in the past 30-40 years, cutting corners to reduce cost etc. Quality wood construction replaced with fake plastic in a lot of cases. Many newer homes contributed to the “Mold Crisis” because the home wouldn’t breathe and retained moisture which made the mold issue worse. This builder should pay a price on this case, but $58 million is asinine.
If i remember when the story originally started, the building company only said they had rejected arbitration after the 800k verdict was given. Sound like they didnt like what they got tried to play the system and lost.
The article was not explicit about the type of damages awarded, but I suspect it was a punitives case. The US Supreme Court has explicitly ruled in Campbell v. State Farm that such excessive awards are unconstitutional because they violate the defendant’s right to due process per the 14th amendment. States rights! is the cry from state courts, not surprisingly in the southern states, where there has been a history of attempted nullification.
Just so there can be no doubt, here ’tis, the constutution’s language :
“…nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Such awards are unfair, unjust, and contrary to the law of the land. Think about this the next time your state government or your state’s courts try to nullify the decisions of the Supreme Court or acts of the United States congress. States rights are no guarantee against tyranny. As an aside, the most conservative justices, Justice Thomas and Justice Scalia, dissented on Campbell v. State Farm, on the basis of, what else?, states rights.
More details on this case were published over the last few years, particularly last year on NPR I believe. The actual damages were quite high, it was not limited to repairs. I’ve been thru a construction defect case. My damages were nowhere near what the Culls had but they sure exceeded my original demand to ‘just make it right.’ By stonewalling, the builders themselves add to the actual damages. Costs add up…lawyers, experts, and many many costs you don’t think about until you have to pay for them. Then there can be alternative living expenses, loss of value of the house, and more. It’s not like the fantasy where the lawyer takes yoru case for free unless he wins it…you have to PAY, all along, for all kinds of things, like a wound that just never stops bleeding.
MOST of the damages awarded to the Culls were punitive, and the jury sent the message that they really wanted this builder to be punished, which is the point of punitive damages. In reality such large awards are almost never paid up. They usually settle or the award is reduced by the court, or appealed or dragged out or just never paid. The jury must have figured that that’s what it’d take to truly punish Bob Perry. He’s spent far more on polical campaigns and smear ads, (and judges), already. I hope the Culls soon collect enough to make them whole again and if they miraculously manage to collect more then so be it. They’be been through enough thanks to this irresponsible builder, that I have no sympathy for Perry. He gives the entire industry a big black eye.
The Culls didn’t reject the $800K arbitration award, Perry refused to accept the ruling despite the fact it was supposed to be binding on both parties. There have been many articles about this case, one being on NPR within about the last year. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102453061
The court documents have also been online. I’ve followed it pretty closely. The Culls at no time were out to profit, and in fact have been financially ruined. They are elderly, and even if one day Perry eventually runs out of options and has to pay them even some of this money, they will never get back the years of their retirement Perry ruined and wasted.
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Gee, I wonder who you voted for. How is that Hopey Changey thing working out for you? Bush had his faults allright and lost his spine for the last 2 years of his Presidency to his discredit. Nancy Pelosi & Harry Reid ran roughshod over him and he signed every spending bill sent his way. No wonder the Republicans were turned away along with having the worst candidate in McCain possible. Progressives in both parties are responsible for this mess and that will be rectified in November.
problem is that everyone wants to blame somone else, including the presidency. in fact, it’s not the president who caused this. it’s the folks that don’t want to take responsibility. juries think that even if a company is wrong, they have deep pockets and can pay anything.
we have companies that are going bankrupt because of these ridiculous payouts, that we can’t keep business alfoat to hire folks. our unemployment is going down and will continue to go down.
Texas Watcher
1. I would invite Bush to my group.
2. He served. I will not stand to let you disparage his service i nthe National Guard. I bet you didnt serve. I bet allllllll that money you didnt. However, I served in combat in Iraq.and I am in the National Guard.
3. Bush is FOR immigration ‘reform’. I disagree with him on this point, but gets your facts correct.
4. They made a shoody home. Its what you get when you employ these unskilled labors. Require skill to work and see who shows up to work that day. Thats how you fix the system.
5. I do take issue with Perry Homes arbitrating and then losing and saying the couple waived. By participation, I think it would be binding? Perhaps it may have been the letter of the law. Yet, it is very shady. I hope the couple gets a new house. 58 million is ridiculous and they will never see close to that amount but its what it takes to send a message. I bet a few more home makers proceed with caution when they are at fualt.
Why was this claim worth a penny more than the perceived/actual decrease in market value, if even that?
If I sued over a perceived market value loss of $150,000 and got an $800,000 award from an arbiter, I’d be dancing in the streets naked with a handle of whiskey in celebration. But instead this family rejects the award and goes to court…then wins, $56 million (about 375 times as much as the drop in market value leading to the suit)???
Can anyone explain?
Is it any wonder why the insurance market has been so squirrely about Construction Defects and exclusions etc? The quality of construction has gone down in this country in the past 30-40 years, cutting corners to reduce cost etc. Quality wood construction replaced with fake plastic in a lot of cases. Many newer homes contributed to the “Mold Crisis” because the home wouldn’t breathe and retained moisture which made the mold issue worse. This builder should pay a price on this case, but $58 million is asinine.
If i remember when the story originally started, the building company only said they had rejected arbitration after the 800k verdict was given. Sound like they didnt like what they got tried to play the system and lost.
The article was not explicit about the type of damages awarded, but I suspect it was a punitives case. The US Supreme Court has explicitly ruled in Campbell v. State Farm that such excessive awards are unconstitutional because they violate the defendant’s right to due process per the 14th amendment. States rights! is the cry from state courts, not surprisingly in the southern states, where there has been a history of attempted nullification.
Just so there can be no doubt, here ’tis, the constutution’s language :
“…nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Such awards are unfair, unjust, and contrary to the law of the land. Think about this the next time your state government or your state’s courts try to nullify the decisions of the Supreme Court or acts of the United States congress. States rights are no guarantee against tyranny. As an aside, the most conservative justices, Justice Thomas and Justice Scalia, dissented on Campbell v. State Farm, on the basis of, what else?, states rights.
More details on this case were published over the last few years, particularly last year on NPR I believe. The actual damages were quite high, it was not limited to repairs. I’ve been thru a construction defect case. My damages were nowhere near what the Culls had but they sure exceeded my original demand to ‘just make it right.’ By stonewalling, the builders themselves add to the actual damages. Costs add up…lawyers, experts, and many many costs you don’t think about until you have to pay for them. Then there can be alternative living expenses, loss of value of the house, and more. It’s not like the fantasy where the lawyer takes yoru case for free unless he wins it…you have to PAY, all along, for all kinds of things, like a wound that just never stops bleeding.
MOST of the damages awarded to the Culls were punitive, and the jury sent the message that they really wanted this builder to be punished, which is the point of punitive damages. In reality such large awards are almost never paid up. They usually settle or the award is reduced by the court, or appealed or dragged out or just never paid. The jury must have figured that that’s what it’d take to truly punish Bob Perry. He’s spent far more on polical campaigns and smear ads, (and judges), already. I hope the Culls soon collect enough to make them whole again and if they miraculously manage to collect more then so be it. They’be been through enough thanks to this irresponsible builder, that I have no sympathy for Perry. He gives the entire industry a big black eye.
The Culls didn’t reject the $800K arbitration award, Perry refused to accept the ruling despite the fact it was supposed to be binding on both parties. There have been many articles about this case, one being on NPR within about the last year. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102453061
The court documents have also been online. I’ve followed it pretty closely. The Culls at no time were out to profit, and in fact have been financially ruined. They are elderly, and even if one day Perry eventually runs out of options and has to pay them even some of this money, they will never get back the years of their retirement Perry ruined and wasted.