§ 99.006.No Limitation on Exemplary Damages

The last section of the chapter, and it removes the final constraint.

Section 41.008(b) does not apply in an action for damages arising from the manufacture of methamphetamine.

That subsection is the exemplary damages cap — the greater of $200,000 or twice economic damages plus noneconomic damages up to $750,000. None of it applies here.

What survives from the damages chapter is the rest of it. Exemplary damages still require clear and convincing evidence of fraud, malice, or gross negligence; the jury must still be unanimous on both liability and amount; and the bifurcated trial and evidentiary provisions still operate. Only the ceiling is removed.

The damages chapter states the same exclusion from its own side, in the subsection providing that the cap section does not apply to a cause of action for damages arising from methamphetamine manufacture as described by this chapter.

Read across the chapter, this is the fourth departure from ordinary Texas tort law for this one activity: strict liability, minimum statutory damages per exposure, joint and several liability with no apportionment, and now uncapped exemplary damages.

Little of the tort reform structure the rest of this code builds applies to a person who manufactures methamphetamine, which is evidently the point.