When multiple people are at fault for causing an accident or otherwise injuring someone, they can usually each be made to pay their own share of damages. However, a system called “joint and several liability” often makes this a bit more confusing and potentially allows victims to claim more damages from one person to make sure they can actually get paid. However, not every state uses this system or uses it in the same way.
Pennsylvania has quite specific rules on joint and several liability. We do use it, but not as a general rule. Instead, the general rule is that everyone pays their fair share of damages, and we only turn to joint and several liability in specific circumstances listed in the law. These include cases involving fraud, intentional torts, high proportions of fault, hazardous substances, and injury cases involving a visibly intoxicated defendant who was overserved at a bar or restaurant.
For a free review of your potential injury claim, call our Pennsylvania personal injury attorneys at The Reiff Law Firm at (215) 709-6940.
What is Joint and Several Liability in Pennsylvania?
Liability is usually determined with each party being assigned a percentage of the blame for the accident and paying that share of the total damages. This is the “general rule” under 42 Pa.C.S. § 7102.
For example, if a car crash involved the victim, Driver A, and Driver B, and it totaled $100,000 in damages for the victim, then the court would assign a percentage of fault to each driver. Let’s say the victim is found 10% at fault, Driver A 60%, and Driver B 30%. There, Driver A would pay the victim $60,000, Driver B would pay $30,000, and the victim would lose $10,000 attributed to their own fault.
This system is called “several” liability. However, this setup can create problems.
Imagine Driver B has good insurance and can cover all of the damages, but Driver A had no insurance and can only cover a few thousand dollars. This leaves the victim without recovery for much of Driver A’s damages – unless of course they use their no-fault insurance and uninsured motorist insurance to make up for Driver A’s lack of insurance. In other kinds of accident cases, a victim might be left without the damages they need if the victim is insolvent or “judgment proof” (i.e., cannot afford the judgment).
When holding parties “jointly” liable, it instead means that they caused the accident together, and they are held at fault together. “Joint and several liability” allows the court to order damages paid by either/both parties and then they can figure out how much to pay each other back. In a case where joint and several liability applies, the victim can get everything paid by the defendant who is able to cover the damages, then that defendant can go back and seek “contribution” from their joint defendant to get paid back for the extra.
When Does Joint and Several Liability Apply in Pennsylvania?
The rest of § 7102 under subsection (a.1) lays out five scenarios where joint and several liability is applied instead of the “general rule” of several liability:
Intentional Misrepresentation
Misrepresentation is essentially a lie. Cases based on parties lying to each other and causing harm can result in joint and several liability because of the intentional nature of the harm. The “harm” in these cases usually is not physical injury, however, and this often comes up in other areas of the law, such as contracts.
Intentional Torts
Intentional torts are – as the name suggests – intentional in nature. This includes things like assault and battery, false imprisonment, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. These are common injury claims our Pennsylvania personal injury lawyers can help with, but intentional torts can also involve libel/defamation and other non-injury cases.
In these cases, the court acknowledges that the parties collaborated to harm you and that the nature of the harm was pretty egregious, and so it justifies making one of them pay more if another of them cannot afford to make you “whole” again.
Defendant Shares 60%+ of the Fault
In most cases, we see liability around 50/50 among two defendants or something like 33/33/33 among three defendants. In cases where the victim shared fault, it might be more like 40/40 or 25/25/25. In these cases where defendants each have a low amount of fault, there is little reason to make one responsible for the others’ damages, so joint and several liability isn’t used.
However, when one defendant already shares most of the blame in an injury case, the court can hold them responsible for all of it and allow the victim to get paid all at once. The cutoff the Pennsylvania legislature decided on was 60% or higher to make one defendant pay all damages under joint and several liability.
This can also make it easier for the victim to get damages in the first place, as co-defendants with low percentages of fault might think they can just dodge payment on something like 5% or 10% fault. It is also ultimately fair because this defendant can sue the other defendants for contribution anyway. This merely shifts the burden of tracking down the other defendants to the wrongdoer instead of the innocent defendant.
Hazardous Substances
Specific hazardous substance claims – namely under § 702 of the Hazardous Sites Cleanup Act – are allowed to use joint and several liability. This is a classic use of joint and several liability, as it is often difficult to determine which specific sites or companies dumped toxic chemicals, and it is easier to make them all jointly liable.
Claims Involving Overserving Visibly Intoxicated Patrons
If someone is overserved at a bar and then goes and hurts someone, the bar or restaurant can be held liable under certain laws, such as “dram shop liability” laws, which hold bars responsible for drunk driving crashes. 47 P.S. § 4-497 puts a limit on this and says that this kind of liability can only extend to the bar/restaurant when the patron they overserved was visibly intoxicated and ends up injuring someone off-site.
Joint and several liability is explicitly applied to claims under this section. This helps victims collect damages against dangerous bars/restaurants when they break the rules associated with their liquor license and overserve visibly intoxicated patrons who then go on to hurt someone else.
Call Our Pennsylvania Personal Injury Lawyers Today
If you were hurt in an accident, call (215) 709-6940 for a free case review from The Reiff Law Firm’s Philadelphia personal injury attorneys.
