If One Craves Litigation, D.C. Is Place to Be

If you live in Utah or Indiana, relax. But watch your back in Washington, D.C., the worst place in the nation in terms of getting sued, according to a survey by Forbes magazine.

Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Mexico and Nevada are not exactly havens from lawsuits either, ranking second through fifth on the magazine’s list of litigious places, made available Sunday.

Forbes reports that the greatest concentration of litigiousness--lawsuits stemming from car accidents to medical malpractice--is in the Northeast, while the Midwest and Rocky Mountain states have lower levels.

The magazine’s ranking says the nation’s capital is by far the worst place in terms of getting sued. Lawyers become involved in 61% of auto accidents in the capital, the average malpractice premium for an orthopedic surgeon is more than $25,000, and the city paid nearly $14 million to settle liability claims in the last fiscal year.

Other findings:

* Detroit juries are six times more generous in their cash awards to plaintiffs who sue the city than juries in Phoenix, the median.

* Nearly two-thirds of car accidents end up involving lawyers in Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey and the District of Columbia.

Forbes devised the ranking by averaging such factors as the percentage of automobile accidents in which lawyers get involved, the average cost for one year’s malpractice insurance for an orthopedic surgeon and the number of members of a state’s trial lawyers association per 100,000 population.