A settlement check doesn't bring anyone back, and it doesn't erase the mornings when their coffee cup sits empty on the counter. Kentucky's wrongful death laws recognize that they can't restore what was taken, but they can address the financial devastation that compounds grief.
A Radcliff wrongful death attorney understands that compensation holds negligent parties accountable and provides families with resources to rebuild. Kentucky law allows for several categories of wrongful death damages, each addressing different aspects of loss.
Economic Damages Kentucky Families May Recover
Economic damages address quantifiable financial losses, the dollars-and-cents consequences of losing a provider or contributor to household income. These losses can be documented, projected, and quantified with relative precision. Kentucky places no statutory cap on economic damages in wrongful death cases.
Funeral and Burial Costs
Kentucky allows families to recover reasonable expenses for funeral services, burial plots, caskets, urns, memorial services, and related costs. These expenses often total $10,000 to $20,000 or more, creating immediate financial pressure when families are least prepared to handle it.
Loss of Earning Capacity and Financial Support
Under KRS 411.130, families can recover compensation for the loss of the deceased person's power to earn money. The calculation considers the person's age, health, occupation, earnings history, education, skills, and expected work-life.
Lost Benefits and Retirement Contributions
Economic damages extend beyond base salary. Health insurance coverage, retirement account contributions, pension benefits, and other employment perks all have monetary value that families can recover.
Non-Economic Damages as Wrongful Death Compensation
Numbers tell part of the story. The rest lives in empty chairs at dinner tables, in questions children ask about a parent who won't answer, in the absence of a partner's hand to hold during hard times. These non-economic damages may be recoverable with a Kentucky wrongful death claim.
Loss of Companionship and Consortium
Kentucky law allows surviving spouses to pursue separate consortium claims for loss of companionship, affection, comfort, and the marital relationship itself. These claims belong to the spouse individually. Imagine a couple married 28 years who raised three children together and planned retirement travel. When one spouse dies in a drunk driving accident, the survivor loses their best friend, their travel companion, and their partner in every sense.
Parental Consortium in the Death of a Minor Child
When a minor child dies, Kentucky law expressly allows parents to recover for loss of affection and companionship in the wrongful death action. Under Mandy Jo's Law, recovery may be limited if a parent abandoned or failed to support the child, but parents who maintained meaningful relationships can seek compensation for the profound loss of their child's presence, love, and future.
No Non-Economic Damages Cap
Kentucky places no statutory cap on non-economic damages in wrongful death or medical malpractice cases, allowing juries to determine appropriate compensation based on the specific circumstances of each loss.
When Punitive Damages Apply to Wrongful Death Cases
Punitive damages punish particularly reckless, malicious, or egregious conduct and deter similar behavior by others. Kentucky courts may award punitive damages when a defendant's conduct showed willful or gross negligence, oppression, fraud, or malice. Standard negligence isn't enough.
Imagine a trucking company that knowingly allows drivers to falsify logbooks, ignore mandatory rest periods, and operate vehicles with failed brakes because fixing violations would hurt profits. A fatal crash caused by these deliberate safety failures might warrant punitive damages.
Kentucky does not impose statutory caps on punitive damages. Factors courts consider when reviewing punitive awards include the likelihood that serious harm would result from the defendant's conduct, the defendant's awareness of that likelihood, the profitability of the misconduct, the duration of the conduct, and any concealment.
Special Consideration for Government Defendants
When the defendant is a state or local government entity, recoveries face different limitations.
Claims against the Commonwealth or its agencies are brought before the Board of Claims and are capped at $250,000 per claim and $400,000 aggregate per single act of negligence. Local government claims may face similar sovereign immunity protections.
The general rule that Kentucky imposes no caps on wrongful death damages does not apply to public defendants, making it critical to identify whether any responsible party is a government entity early in the case.