Quotient verdict
Definition
An award of damages calculated by a jury dividing the sum of each juror's proposed award by the number of jurors. A quotient verdict is generally improper—in particular, if a jury agrees in advance to calculate its award using a quotient verdict—due to a lack of full deliberation of issues.
Illustrative caselaw
See, e.g. McDonald v. Pless, 238 U.S. 264 (1915).
See also
Definition from Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary
An award of money damages in a lawsuit obtained by averaging the amounts of damages awarded by jurors when they disagree as to what the award should be. A quotient verdict is not legal since it is not based on a rational discussion of the facts, and such a verdict will be set aside and a mistrial will be declared by the judge.
Definition provided by Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary.
August 19, 2010, 5:23 pm
