Louisiana lawmakers dissect personal injury laws as attorney-legislators protest

House lawmakers advanced six bills targeting personal injury lawsuits Tuesday in the opening salvo of the Louisiana Legislature’s ongoing debate over high insurance rates. 

“I guess we can say this is opening day, and here’s your first pitch,” Rep. Jay Gallé, R-Mandeville, said to the House Civil Law Committee while presenting one of six so-called tort reform bills the committee considered Tuesday. 

Out of the six bills, one of the most hotly contested would limit the ability for people to recover damages for injuries sustained in accidents for which they are mostly at fault. House Bill 431 sponsored by Rep. Emily Chenevert, R-Baton Rouge, cleared the committee in an 11-4 vote along party lines. 

Her bill would change Louisiana’s comparative fault statute, which assigns a percentage of blame to each party in an accident and allows for the recovery of damages in proportion with those percentages. The statute often arises in cases that involve multiple negligent acts by multiple people, some more to blame than others. 

In theory, someone partly at fault for an accident can potentially recover some of the awarded damages. Chenevert’s bill would change that to prohibit any amount of recovery by a party who’s 51% or more at fault. 

“You should not be able to collect if the accident is mostly your fault,” Chenevert said. “I would say that’s common sense. Should we reward negligence?”

But Rep. Chad Brown, D-Plaquemine, pointed out that the bill only modifies comparative fault on the plaintiff’s side and not the defendant’s. As a result, a defendant would still be protected by the liability proportions. 

“There’s a double standard here that the plaintiff is going to get zeroes if he’s 51% at fault, and the defendant is only gonna pay 51% if he’s 51% at fault,” said Brown, who is an attorney. “… The plaintiff is more imperiled than the defendant.”

Chenevert said 34 other states have a version of the law.

The committee similarly advanced House Bill 34, sponsored by Rep. Brian Glorioso, R-Slidell, in a 11-3 vote. His measure would change state law to allow any party to introduce evidence related to medical expenses. 

Currently, the law prevents juries from seeing what accident victims actually pay for medical treatment and only allows them to see what a doctor billed. In many instances, however, medical providers don’t actually receive the full amounts that they bill. At other times, Glorioso said, some lawyers work with doctors who inflate their medical billings just to get an increased payout for the plaintiff. 

Glorioso’s bill would limit a claimant’s recovery of medical expenses to “reasonable” amounts, which would be left for a judge or jury to decide. 

“Let’s let the jury see all of the evidence,” he said. “Let’s not blindfold them and just let them see one side.”

Brown countered, saying defendants get to hide details from jurors, such as whether insurance coverage is available for injuries a victim claims. He said he supports leveling the playing field between plaintiffs and insurance companies.

The committee saw Republicans prevail in another vote on House Bill 443, sponsored by Rep. Chance Henry, R-Crowley. His bill would require plaintiffs to notify defendants of an intent to file a lawsuit within 10 days of retaining a lawyer. 

Currently, plaintiffs’ lawyers can gather evidence and prepare for a lawsuit for almost two full years before a defendant is even aware a suit is coming. Henry said his bill would give a defendant the same amount of time to prepare for a claim as a plaintiff..

Democrats on the committee said if plaintiffs will be required to provide such a notice, then defendants should at least be required to respond to that notice with similar information – such as contact information for the insurance company’s lawyer and claims adjuster. 

Rep. Ed Larvadain, D-Alexandria, said many of the insurance companies he deals with in his law practice won’t return calls or even provide email addresses for anyone at the company. 

Rep. Nick Muscarello, R-Hammond, questioned how the requirement would even be enforced and encouraged Henry to work with the concerned lawmakers on potential amendments before the bill is debated on the House floor. Henry said he would.

House Bill 434, sponsored by Rep. Jason DeWitt, R-Alexandria, advanced to the floor in an 11-2 vote but saw no debate. The proposal would limit bodily injury claims by plaintiffs who did not carry auto insurance at the time of the accident. It also would forbid uninsured plaintiffs’ recovery on the first $100,000 worth of damages. 

Other bills the committee advanced include House Bill 450, sponsored by Rep. Michael Melerine, R-Shreveport, and House Bill 291, sponsored by Gallé. 

Melerine’s bill would end the Housley presumption, a standard of evidence explained in a 1991 Louisiana Supreme Court ruling that applies to auto accidents, medical malpractice and other injury lawsuits. In a nutshell, the Housley presumption says courts should assume a plaintiff’s injuries resulted from the accident in question if they were in good health beforehand.  

Lawmakers have tried repeatedly to revoke Housley, but those attempts either failed or were vetoed in previous years. This year is expected to be different as Gov. Jeff Landry recently signaled support for the measure. 

Gallé’s bill would extend the filing deadline, called a “prescriptive period,” for wrongful death lawsuits from one year to two, aligning Louisiana with the deadline found in most other states. 

Proponents of the bill have argued that a shorter prescriptive period attracts more frivolous lawsuits by essentially forcing people to quickly file claims so as to not lose their litigation rights. The proposal also complements a similar measure lawmakers approved last year to extend the deadline for filing personal injury claims.   

The committee quickly advanced both bills without objection.