October 09, 2025, Law.com / Legal Intelligencer by writer Riley Brennan.

A new bill attempting to expand attorneys’ ability to argue for specific damages at trial has received mixed reactions from attorneys in the state, with plaintiffs attorneys generally in favor and defense attorneys saying it might prejudice their clients.

Last week, a bill looking to allow attorneys to suggest damages during closing arguments at trial was introduced in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives by state Rep. Tim Brennan, D-Bucks. Currently, attorneys in the state are prohibited from quantifying, or asking juries for a specific amount of noneconomic damages during a civil trial. The bill proposes that attorneys be allowed to suggest a specific number of noneconomic damages during closing arguments, while requiring the parties to disclose their arguments to the court and opposing counsel before they are presented in front of the jury.

Some attorneys believe this proposal could be a positive change, including personal injury attorney Keith Thomas West of the Victims’ Recovery Law Center in Newtown Square.

“I think it just makes it easier for the attorneys to lay out the facts that were presented during the trial to the jury,” West said. “It enables the plaintiff’s attorney and the defense attorney to make closing arguments that address every issue that the jury has to decide.”

The current rules, West said, can lead to the “odd situation” where attorneys have to tread very carefully when it comes to certain topics, or sometimes not even address big parts of the case even though juries will need to decide those issues during deliberations.

“The defense are going to come up with ways of framing these issues to try to minimize emotional impact and the dollar value of that, and the plaintiffs have arguments to make these issues seem as real to the jury as possible,” West said. “Ultimately, it’s still going to be a jury question on what they think is fair, but this at least allows the attorneys to address those issues.”

According to West, cases involving emotional distress would be impacted by the change, including cases like the $1 million verdict his client received last year against the city of Philadelphia after eight officers warrantlessly entered his client’s apartment, held his client at gunpoint, and fatally shot her dog. West noted that suffering like emotional distress can be hard to ascribe a quantitative number, so the potential change would make it easier for attorneys to talk about.

Defense attorney Maureen M. McBride, co-chair of Lamb McErlane’s appellate department, said the proposed change would raise a number of difficulties for defendants and defense attorneys, and that any number proposed would likely not be pegged to reality.

“When a lawyer suggests a dollar amount for noneconomic damages, it’s not grounded in expertise or evidence—it’s a guess designed to sway the jury with an arbitrary figure. Lawyers aren’t trained to measure noneconomic damages, and even judges have acknowledged the difficulty of assigning a meaningful value to them,” McBride said.

Further, she said, once a number is given, defense attorneys would then be in a problematic position of needing to propose a counter number.

“Worse still, this tactic forces defendants into a no-win situation: to counter the anchoring effect of the plaintiff’s number, they must offer a figure of their own—despite maintaining that there’s no liability and the proper amount is zero,” she said.

The bill titled “Permitting Additional Information for Jurors in Judicial Proceedings” was introduced early last month and referred to the judiciary committee on Oct. 1. So far it has gained six co-sponsors, all of whom are Democrats haling from either York, Bucks, Philadelphia or Lancaster counties.

Echoing West’s sentiments, personal injury attorney Kevin R. Marciano of Marciano Legal also noted it can be difficult for jurors to decide how much someone’s everyday pain or suffering is actually worth. But, he said, that, while plaintiffs attorneys may appreciate the change because it will allow them to ask for larger or more specific amounts, others may argue the change is necessary to stop juries from awarding too high a verdict.

He cautioned that, regardless, both sides would have to keep in mind not to offend the jury with their suggested amount, whether it be egregiously high or low.

“You have to be really careful on what you’re asking for not to offend a jury because then it could go the other way,” Marciano said, noting attorneys would want to avoid coming off as greedy or as if they were low-balling the opposing side.

He also noted that the potential change could encourage parties to settle in order to avoid going back and forth over proposed damages in front of a jury, as well as the possibility of a jury
adopting a party’s potentially inflated proposed amount.

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