For a personal injury claim in North Carolina is there a cap on awards?

Personal injury law in North Carolina does not have a cap on awards to plaintiffs. One possible explanation for this is that North Carolina follows the rule of contributory negligence.

Contributory negligence is a legal rule that denies recovery to any plaintiff who had any level of responsibility for his/her injuries. This means that if a pedestrian crosses at a red light and is hit by an oncoming vehicle, the pedestrian plaintiff would not be able to recover any damages from the driver of the vehicle. Under contributory negligence, the measurement of fault between the parties is irrelevant. Comparative negligence, on the other hand, simply diminishes the possible recovery to a personal injury plaintiff by whatever percentage that plaintiff is found to be responsible for his/her own injuries.

A plaintiff can be at fault by 1% under contributory negligence and will still be barred by law from pursuing a negligence claim against the defendant. North Carolina is only one of 5 states that currently follows the rule of contributory negligence since this rule is very strict when it comes to personal injury claims.

It is very hard to prevail in a negligence suit in a jurisdiction that follows the rule of contributory negligence. There are very few personal injury lawsuits where the plaintiff had no fault whatsoever for his/her own injuries and defendants with any plausible argument showing even the slightest fault on the part of the plaintiff will be able to avoid negligence lawsuits.