If a wrongful death claim includes future damages such as the lost wages of the decedent, the calculations necessary to enter a judgment can be tricky, because wrongful death damages are fixed as of the date of death. To fairly calculate such damages, one must discount a series of future losses to their “present value” as of the date of death, and then add interest from the date of death to the date of judgment. This is not as simple as it sounds, as we see in Toledo v. Christo,1 a recent Court of Appeals case in which the majority and dissent disagreed on the rates for discounting future damages and the calculation of interest.
EPTL 5-4.3 states that a wrongful death award shall provide fair and just compensation for the pecuniary injuries resulting from the decedent’s death, including “…[i]nterest on the principal sum recovered by the plaintiff from the date of the decedent’s death[,]” and mandates that interest be “ …added to and be a part of the total sum award.”
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