Tort Law: The Buffalo Creek Disaster

In his quote, Raymond Sugarman argues that tort law allows individuals to be compensated after injury, guarantees effective deterrence, and that it operates at low cost. Tort law provides individuals with the means necessary to receive compensation when injured, however, this does not always like Sugarman states “make the injured whole”. When considering the injured party it is important to note that there are other factors besides the monetary compensation that cannot be fixed by tort law. Tort law also does not serve as a bulletproof strategy for deterrence. In many cases deterrence through tort law is not visible or at best minimal but defiantly not “guaranteed”. As a result society does not benefit from these cases very often. Because these

In this case the survivors encountered psychological issues that arose from the disaster that could not simply be “readdressed”. This case involved one of the deadliest floods in the nation’s history, killing a total of 125 people and injuring over 1,000(stern, 1). Many people lost their homes and their property. About 600 people decided to sue the Pittston coal mining company for the damages (stern, 2). The outcome of the case resulted in a $13.5 million settlement between the company and the plaintiffs (stern, 269). Although many people would argue that the survivors received an amazing deal, the truth is that for many of them their lives were never the same regardless of the money. Many of the survivors were diagnosed with physiological trauma that the American Psychiatric Association established as post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD (Stern, 275). As one of the plaintiffs Doris Mullins put it “ the money can help us live an easier life, free from problems, but it can never put our minds completely at ease, because nothing but death can stop our minds from going back to that morning” (Stern, 272). The survivors of Buffalo Creek disaster therefore would not agree with Sugarman and his concept of being “whole again” through tort

Therefore one lawsuit is not enough to stop Corporations from neglecting safety regulations in the future. His argument therefore loses credibility and leaves no other explanation as to exactly how tort lawsuits are cost effective. The process of going through a tort lawsuit in itself can be very lengthy, and as a result very costly. Many cases can take months if not years to reach trial and settlement. Like Kalgan mentions these cases sometimes end up “spending more money on litigation costs than on payments that end up in injured plaintiffs pockets” (Kagan, 138). As a result many possible cases never make it to court, because “the costliness and uncertainty of the tort system…”(Kagan, 139) deters many injured individuals from even filing a case. Instead of benefiting from these lawsuits “many victims give up and recover nothing once they confront…legalistic resistance” (Kagan, 139). Not only does tort law not produce great results at low costs, it deters society from pursuing such cases. It would have been more accurate for Sugarman to argue that tort law serves as guarantee deterrence for society and not for Corporations. When individuals do pursue these cases and win, the punitive damages towards corporations often just send