Washington State Supreme Court Refuses To Cap Punitive Damages Imposed Under Federal Maritime Law - Clausen v. Icicle Seafoods, Inc.

On the Ides of March, the Washington State Supreme Court delivered the latest pronouncement on the issue of punitive damages under the archaic system of maintenance, cure, and unearned wages for maritime workers who go to sea. Clausen v. Icicle Seafoods, Inc., 2012 WL 862192 (Wash. No. 85200-6, Mar. 15, 2012), refused to overturn a punitive damage and attorney's fee award, following what both levels of court determined to be "egregious" handling of the injured worker's claim by his employer, the fishing company.

Punitive Damages and the Maintenance and Cure Obligation

Clausen provides one of the first appellate court interpretations of Atlantic Sounding Co. v. Townsend, 557 U.S. 404, 129 S.Ct. 2561, 174 L.Ed.2d 382 (2009), the U.S. Supreme Court's pronouncement that punitive damages are available under general maritime law for the willful and wanton disregard of the maintenance and cure obligation. Prior to Atlantic Sounding Co. v. Townsend, most courts allowed only an attorney fee award for "callous" and "willful and persistent" refusal to pay maintenance and cure benefits, in accord with Vaughan v. Atkinson, 369 U.S. 527, 82 S.Ct. 997, 8 L.Ed.2d 88 (1962).

"Maintenance and cure" is the system that continues to exist today under which seamen are provided benefits if they become unfit for duty while engaged in the service of the vessel. If a seaman becomes unfit for duty because of injury or illness, he/she receives a daily stipend for each day of unfitness (maintenance) and unfitness (maintenance) and medical bills for treatment (cure). Maintenance and cure was the first system of workers' compensation in the world; it began in the Mediterranean countries, perhaps during the 12th Century, was adopted by British admiralty law, and thereafter by common law in the United States. Today, seamen are some of the very few workers in the United States who are not subject to modern workers' compensation systems, which exist by statute instead of common law. For compensation beyond maintenance, cure, and unearned wages, the seaman must establish that the vessel was unseaworthy (also a common law right) or that the vessel employer was negligent (a right bestowed by statute, the Jones Act, in 1920); if unseaworthiness and/or negligence are established, the plaintiff can recover pain and suffering, long-term economic damages, and the usual elements of damage in a personal injury lawsuit.

Traditionally, the vessel's obligation of maintenance and cure...