A Massachusetts judge has declined to reduce the $91 million damages award she approved last September for a construction worker’s personal injury claim, an award she herself characterized as “grossly excessive” but found is required by statute and precedent.
Suffolk Superior Court Justice Debra Squires-Lee found that because Liberty Mutual insurers “willfully” failed to investigate and make a reasonable offer to injured worker John Rooney, she was obligated under state law to at least double the verdict issued by a jury in August 2021.
The $26.6 million verdict consisted of $1 million for past medical expenses, $2.1 million for past lost earning capacity, $5.5 million for past pain and suffering, and $18 million for future pain and suffering. After inclusion of a hefty pre-judgment interest charge (reflecting unusual delays because of COVID-19), the final compensatory judgment entered was $45.49 million, which ballooned to more than $91 million after doubling.
The judge said she expects that her ruling will be appealed.
In addition to citing the insurer’s failures in investigating and negotiating offers, the judge suggested Liberty was also hurt by failing to argue that such a large award raised constitutional issues even though it was put on notice that it could face such a large award.
Rooney, a mason, was seriously injured while working on the refurbishment of the Longfellow Bridge that spans Boston and Cambridge when he fell on interior scaffolding. Rooney alleged that the construction firm White-Skanska-Consigli was liable for his injuries because the scaffolding was not compliant with Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulations and had not been properly inspected. The insurers involved were Liberty Mutual companies Peerless, Liberty Mutual Fire and Ohio Casualty Insurance Co.
By the time of trial, defense counsel did not challenge the scope of Rooney’s injuries or medical causation or that Rooney’s injuries, multiple surgeries, and permanent damage were related to his fall.
Liberty and the defendant balked at the jury verdict total and sought a new trial or a reduction in the damages by the judge. They complained that the “purported compensatory damages awards were grossly disproportionate” to the trial evidence and were “astronomically higher than other comparable Massachusetts verdicts.”
In the meantime, in September 2021, Liberty offered Rooney the policy limits of $19.5 million, which Rooney rejected. In February 2022, after indicating he would settle the claim for Liberty’s policy limits plus $7.5 million from the construction company’s excess carriers (AIG insurers), Rooney changed course.
In April 2022, Rooney sent Liberty a written demand alleging unfair and deceptive acts in violation of the state’s unfair insurance practices law (Chapter 176). Rooney stressed that if he proved Liberty acted willfully, he would be entitled to a punitive damage award under the state’s consumer and business protection law (Chapter 93A) of at least two times the underlying judgment.
Liberty filed for a declaratory judgment that it had not violated Chapters 93A or 176 because it “carefully monitored the case prior to trial and reasonably determined that liability was not reasonably clear” and, after judgment, “carefully re-assessed the claim and promptly offered the full limits of the applicable policies.”
In September 2025 after a 10-day trial on Liberty’s declaration, the judge found that the evidence showed the insurer had willfully violated Chapter 176. She noted that the statute and governing law required her, at a minimum, to double the judgment.
In her ruling, she expressed her subjective view that the finding of willfulness resulted in a “grossly excessive punitive damages award against Liberty far in excess of the goals the statute is designed to achieve.” But, upon concluding that the statute and controlling precedent offered her no discretion, she ordered judgment of $91 million, or two times the jury award.
In seeking the declaratory judgment, Liberty did not argue that if the court found willfulness, the doubling or trebling of the underlying tort judgment would be grossly excessive and/or violative of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Instead, Liberty argued that any court would likely conclude that the verdict was an “outlier, well beyond the type of verdicts typically returned in cases of this nature.”
Rooney argued that by not arguing the constitutional issues when it knew that if found to have willfully violated the law the damages could be double, Liberty had waived its due process argument.