The state Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a Morris County judge who slashed a $1 million jury award to $200,000 based on his “feel of the case,” his experience as a judge and litigator and a comparison with other verdicts.
The Court’s 3-2 majority in He v. Miller , A-81-09, said all those factors could be used. Further, comparing verdicts does not require identical facts, but ones similar enough to create an “understanding of where the edges of the wide range of acceptable are found and a careful articulation of why and how a particular verdict has so exceeded those bounds that it cannot stand.”
