Nuclear verdicts: A litigator’s perspective

Nuclear verdicts are on the rise. What’s fueling the gigantic payouts, and why are juries so likely to award them?

During the 2025 Best Fleets to Drive For Education and Awards Conference earlier this year, attorney Kevin Mulvaney, partner at Wilson Elser, weighed in on what can help — and what can hurt — motor carriers that are facing litigation.

“I defend trucking companies and advise them, but today I want to share with you what the other side’s doing,” Mulvaney said. “The plaintiff’s attorneys — the attorneys that you see, the advertisements, the billboards, everything like that — how are they getting to these multimillion-dollar verdicts?”

According to Mulvaney, the aim of many plaintiffs’ attorneys is to go after anything and everything they can. This includes property, cash equipment and more.

Jury distractions can result in nuclear verdicts

One factor Mulvaney addressed is the jury selected for a trial, and how those jurors can be preconditioned long before the selection process ever begins.

Every day, while driving along highways and city streets, people see advertisements where lawyers are boasting about the $500 million settlement they’ve gotten for clients. Those big numbers have snaked their way into people’s minds, so when a jury hears that a number like $25 million, they think it’s too small of a settlement.

“The idea is that the (plaintiff’s attorneys) are going to have the jury think about everything except the case,” Mulvaney said.

(They basically tell the jury) “Don’t worry about the defensive driving that the driver might have tried to handle. Don’t worry (that) my client may or may not have faked (an injury). Don’t worry about the surveillance that the defense attorney has on the (plaintiff). All I want you to think about is this big bad trucking company,” he continued.

Mulvaney noted that jurors tend to award these huge verdicts, thinking that they’re sending a message to trucking companies: Operate in a safer manner.

While most trucking industry stakeholders wouldn’t buy this strategy, it actually does work on most juries.

“It works for jurors because they just think, ‘This is my time to shine. I can do right for my community,’” he said. “And some company … hurt somebody — it might be someone they know, someone that lives in their neighborhood. And they think, ‘I want to make sure that doesn’t happen again. So, I’m going to hit ’em where it hurts — in the pocketbook.’”

According to Mulvaney, attorneys going for these nuclear verdicts paint it as helping the little guy stick it to the “big, bad corporation.”

“Nuclear verdicts are something that have been around for about 20 years, give or take,” Mulvaney said, adding that generally the idea has been that any verdict awarding over $10 million was considered “nuclear.”

“Well, those days are kind of over,” he said. “Now we’re talking about thermonuclear verdicts — $100 million. These verdicts are coming much more often.”

How can motor carriers protect themselves?

Mulvaney outlined several ways trucking companies can help combat the strategies employed by unscrupulous attorneys.

Reduce Risks

While most carriers have safety policies in place, those policies are sometimes not enforced as strictly as they should be.

“Every company should look in the mirror. If you have policies you can’t follow, you shouldn’t have them,” Mulvaney said, pointing to operational failures, which could be something as simple as trucks breaking down because of improper maintenance.

This could be because of a “profits over safety” mindset.

“Were you cutting corners as a company? You needed to get that, that load delivered somewhere. So, you might have, you know, might not have followed your PM schedule as you should have,” he noted. Such practices can make litigation “so easy for a plaintiff’s attorney.”

Of course, the risk of being subject to a high-dollar verdict also depends on the area in which the case is heard, he said. A quick internet search will reveal numerous studies and breakdowns of the states, and counties within those states, where such verdicts are most often rendered. (NOTE: The Trucker tried this and found a helpful guide published by USLaw.)

“The idea behind these is that the judges might be very plaintiff-friendly,” Mulvaney said. “There’s also a lot of issues with state court in some states with respect to what’s admissible and what’s not — and it almost always is going to lean towards being more plaintiff-friendly.”

Be Proactive

“The most important thing here is proactivity. Do not wait until an incident occurs,” Mulvaney said.

He says it helps to think ahead. For example, what would your company’s team members say if called on to testify about your policies and safety record?

“Let’s go through hiring. Let’s go through training. Let’s go through retention,” he said.

It’s important that a company’s team members can truthfully tell a plaintiff’s attorney and the jury, “I support what we did. We hired the right people, we maintained our policies and we had zero tolerance.”

Some fleet operators might be hesitant to enforce a zero-tolerance policy because it can be difficult to find and keep qualified drivers. After all, everyone makes mistakes, right?

“I get it, that it’s tough to find drivers, it’s tough to keep drivers,” Mulvaney acknowledged. “But if you have a policy — for example, (if a driver has) X number of moving violations within so many months it means termination.

“If you choose to skip over that, guess what’s going to happen? Karma is going to hit you, and that’s going to be the driver that causes that next serious accident,” he continued. “Then you’re going to have to explain to a plaintiff’s attorney, maybe to a jury, someday why you decided to cut corners.”

Take the Right Steps After an Accident

“If you have something occur and you want to keep it in-house, make sure you’re being proactive,” Mulvaney said. “Make sure you’re aligning with your broker, with your insurance agent, with the TPA (third-party administrator), with your insurance company immediately.”

According to Mulvaney, if one of a carrier’s trucks is involved in a serious accident, it’s vital that all the necessary parties become involved immediately. Evidence needs to be preserved, statements need to be taken, and the company needs to begin additional investigation.

“If, for example, let’s say you’ve made that decision: ‘Well, we weren’t at fault, but we know there was a bad accident or bad injuries on the other side,’ so you chose to keep that tractor on the road,” he posited, noting that not all accidents are reported to a carriers’ insurance company.

“(Let’s say the tractor) continues driving and gets into another accident,” he continued. “Then you get a letter a couple days later from a plaintiff’s attorney — about that first accident.”

They’ll want to inspect the tractor, maybe do a 3D scan, look at everything.

“You’ll have to say, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. It was involved in another accident. You still want to look at it?’” he said. “They’re going to say, ‘Well, you spoiled that evidence.’ This is a huge problem.”

Once evidence — whether that evidence proves a carrier’s fault or innocence — is gone, it can’t be re-created. That’s why it’s vital that a company go through the proper process following every incident, whether it’s claimed on insurance or not.

In the End

“It’s unfortunately getting worse until real court reform occurs — which unfortunately is not happening anytime soon,” Mulvaney said. “So (you must) have your own plan put in place to make sure you are not that next target.

“You have to enforce your own policies — or don’t have them,” he continued. “In my opinion, there’s no such thing as too much insurance.”

According to Mulvaney, the last thing a company owner wants to do is be the loser in a court battle ending in an excessive financial settlement. Numerous carriers have been forced to lay off workers or shut down completely as a result of such situations.

“The plaintiff’s attorneys, quite frankly, they just do not care (that your business suffers),” Mulvaney said.

The best defense is for carriers to build a workplace culture based on safety and driver retention, and to build driver support programs to help ensure their fleet is well maintained and compliant with regulations.

“And finally, a good file is a closed file. If you can get something closed out before a lawsuit’s filed, even if it’s paying a little more than you really would like to, quite frankly, it’s better than paying me,” he said.

“We’ll fight the same fight; you’re paying the same money, your insurance company’s paying the same money — and you’re not running the risk of something that you didn’t even think about,” he concluded.