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Ability to Pay Punitive-Damage Award Can’t Be Assumed

Jul 16, 2026

The Court of Appeal for this district has reversed an award of punitive damages in the amount of $250,000, holding that it cannot stand in the absence of evidence as to the appellant’s financial worth, and observing that an ability to pay cannot be inferred from evidence that that the woman owns a house in Woodland Hills and applied more than $500,000 of her own money to fixing the house she was claiming, in probate proceedings to be hers.