Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. v. Haeger
U.S. Supreme Court · decided April 18, 2017 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Decided
- April 18, 2017
- Term
- October Term 2016
- Vote
- 8–0
- Majority author
- Justice Kagan
- Issue area
- Judicial Power
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice KAGAN delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case, we consider a federal court's inherent authority to sanction a litigant for bad-faith conduct by ordering it to pay the other side's legal fees. We hold that such an order is limited to the fees the innocent party incurred solely because of the misconduct-or put another way, to the fees that party would not have incurred but for the bad faith. A district court has broad discretion to calculate fee awards under that standard. But because the court here granted legal fees beyond those resulting from the litigation misconduct, its award cannot stand. I Respondents Leroy, Donna, Barry, and Suzanne Haeger sued the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (among other defendants) after the family's motorhome swerved off the road and flipped over. The Haegers alleged that the failure of a Goodyear G159 tire on the vehicle caused the accident: Their theory was that the tire was not designed to withstand the level of heat it generated when used on a motorhome at highway speeds. Discovery in the case lasted several years-and itself generated considerable heat. The Haegers repeatedly asked Goodyear to turn over internal test results for the G159, but the company's responses were both slow in coming and unrevealing in content. After making the District Court referee some of their more contentious discovery battles, the parties finally…
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