Whether the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires a strict proportionality test for punitive damages awards when compensatory damages are substantial, particularly in cases involving economic harm

No question identified. : below, which is reported at 418 So. 3d 1173 (Miss. 2024), r’hing denied (Oct. 2, 2025), is attached as Exhibit 1. A copy of the judgment and order denying rehearing is attached as Exhibit 2. This Court’s jurisdiction would be invoked under 28 U.S.C. § 1254(1). Absent an extension, a petition for a writ of certiorari is due on December 31, 2025. This application is being filed more than ten days in advance of that date, and no prior application has been made. This case implicates the due process limits on punitive damages when a plaintiff has already recovered substantial compensatory damages. See State Farm Mutual Auto Insurance Co. v. Campbell, 538 U.S. 408, 425 (2004); BMW of North America v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559, 582 (1996). “When compensatory damages are substantial, then a lesser ratio, perhaps only equal to compensatory damages, can reach the outermost limit of the due process guarantee.” State Farm, 538 U.S. at 425. State Farm teaches that this concern is heightened when, as here, the plaintiff incurred only economic harm. Jd. at 419, 426. In the two decades since State Farm was decided, however, lower courts have irretrievably diverged in applying its guidance. Some have recognized that, even if the “exercise” is “imprecise,” the Constitution directs that “a punitive damages award can be so out of whack that it screams a violation of due process,” and that jurors are “often left to pick a number out of the sky, tethered to nothing more than the jury’s emotional reaction to the misdeeds of a corporation with deep pockets.” Williams v. First Advantage LNS Screening Sol’ns, 947 F.3d 735, 762-68 (11th Cir. 2020) (Fair Credit Reporting Act case; remitting punitive damages to 4:1 ratio); accord, eg., Jurinko v. Med. Protective Co., 305 F. App’x 13, 27-28 (8d Cir. 2008) (remitting punitive damages to 1:1 ratio in insurance bad-faith case involving $1,658,345 in contractual damages); Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Justin Combs Pub., 507 F.8d 470, 490 (6th Cir. 2007) (copyright case; “Given the large compensatory damages award of $366,939, a substantial portion of which contained a punitive element, and the low level of reprehensibility of defendants’ conduct, a ratio of closer to 1:1 or 2:1 is all that due process can tolerate in this case.”); UnitedHealthCare Ins. Co. v. Fremont Emer. Servs. (Mandavia), Ltd, 570 P.3d 107, 126-27 (Nev. 2025) (Prompt Pay Act and other statutory-damages case; reducing to 1:1 ratio where plaintiff recovered $2,650,512 in compensatory damages). Some lower courts, however, have read State Farm’s instructions much more fluidly. The reporters abound with decisions imposing significant punitive damages on top of substantial compensatory damages. See, e.g., Masters v. City of Indep., 998 F.3d 827, 842 (8th Cir. 2021) (holding that district court erred by reducing punitive damages and increasing ratio to 9:1); In re 3M Combat Earplugs Prods. Liab. Litig., 2022 WL 18539719, at *4 (N.D. Fla. Dec. 29, 2022) (holding compensatory damages “oe of nearly $1 million not “ ‘substantial’ enough to warrant a 1:1 ratio” and instead approving 9:1 ratio); Doe v. Parrillo, 185 N.E.3d 1248, 1264 (Ill. 2021) (reinstating $8 million punitive award that lower court had reduced to equal $1 million compensatory damages). Though by no means standing alone, State courts are frequently even more willing to downplay State Farm’s instructions. See, e.g., Ingham v. Johnson & Johnson, 608 S.W.3d 663, 723 (Mo. Ct. App. 2020) (affirming punitive damages award of $4.14 billion against $550 million in compensatory damages “[b]ecause Defendants are large, multi-billion dollar corporations”); Yung v. Grant Thornton, LLP, 563 S.W.3d 22, 72 (Ky. 2018) (reinstating $80 million punitive award against accounting firm held liable for $20 million in compensatory damages for economic harm); Bullock v. Philip Morris USA, Inc., 198 Cal. App. 4th 548, 573 (2011) (affirming 16:1 ratio where plaintiff recovered $850,000 in compe