Harrow said..
"A half a million dollar payout to the parents of Scots College student Nathan Chaina after he died on a school camp has been dwarfed by the $8.3 million costs order made against the couple following an 11-year legal battle.

The crushing judgment is compounded by the revelation that the Chainas were offered $8.16 million to settle the case in 2010, which they rejected."

www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nathan-chainas-family-ordered-to-pay-scots-college-8-million-in-legal-fees-20140731-zyuze.html

At first I thought poor buggers, then I read the story.

Eight millllon dollars.........
thats 8,000,000 dollars....
oh my heart goes out to them, GEe with hindsight they would be rich and could buy a new baby, maybe one who is more better looking than them!
Maybe purchase twins and take the pick of the litter.

Good job. It's greedy people like these that make our laws and insurances convoluted, mindless and restrictive.

jn1 said...
Good job. It's greedy people like these that make our laws and insurances convoluted, mindless and restrictive.

Right. Cos kids are worth so much more... at least $10 million.

Well at least it looks like the lawyers did extremely will out of this one.

Kamikuza said..
I see several people didn't get the sarcasm... no surprise there then.

The point is, with these law suits it's less about the money and more about punishing the other party and putting others on their toes to avoid repeats, than putting a price on someone's life.

Derp, y'all.

I don't know. In this case, it seems that the parents figured it was an opportunity to make some money. The comments from the court case suggest that the judge thought the parents were not 100% truthful about the effect the loss of their son had on their lives. It also suggests that they were not truthful about this new cleaning product that was supposed to make them $300M.

If its about punishment, how much is enough? Ultimately there will be an insurance company somewhere that will be paying the majority of the damages, and this may mean that the school doesn't see much impact. Did they find any negligence? Have procedures and policies been changed to reduce the chance of this happening again?

There is something wrong with the law if they get lumbered with $8m of fees, justice should be about ethics and equity not have much money you can spend on a lawyer.

a very reasonable offer to settle of $8m

We're not talking about smashed up in a car accident and spending some time in hospital... regardless of lies, a child is dead in an untimely manner. Interesting that isn't seen as the important issue...

"More than reasonable" is the bit that sticks in the craw. I agree with you on the rest...

dan berry said..
That's at least the second kid that I know of to die at a scots camp. What the hell do they do at their camps???

lots of soggy sao...

I think we are talking about the same guy.

dan berry said..
I think we are talking about the same guy.

No - 2 students have drowned, first was in 1990 (we played in the same footy team) & then 1999

Kamikuza said..

stamp said...

Kamikuza said..
"More than reasonable" is the bit that sticks in the craw. I agree with you on the rest...

i still think you're looking at this the wrong way. the money offered is not in any way attempting to put a price on a human life; a life is not quantifiable. nobody was trying to claim loss of life was worth a specific amount.

the school wasn't saying "here's 8 mil, that's what we think your son is worth". the money was to compensate the parents' claim for money they lost because of the impact of their son's death on their business & earning capacity. it turns out that $8mil was far more than reasonable given that the court decided $500k was accurate

Does Australia not do "damages"?

I am definitely not a lawyer, but isn't that what damages are? Where you can show a loss, whether it is real or calculated/anticipated?

In this case, it appears that they were saying that the damages were $300 million, because that's what they would have made if they had released this product, which they couldn't because of grief. The judge seems to have suggested their grief did not affect their work for as long as they contended, and that the $300M was probably a stretch.

Punitive damages? Aren't they used when you can show that someone was intentionally negligent?

I should have read the article more thoroughly... I blame this crqppy phone!

Kamikuza said..
I should have read the article more thoroughly... I blame this crqppy phone!

LOL, yes, always a good idea if you are going to promote a contrary view to the majority.