A reasonableness-only state for fees
Compare Rhode Island to a state like New York, which applies a hard statutory sliding scale to medical malpractice attorney fees specifically. Rhode Island has no equivalent figure anywhere in its rules for any type of personal injury claim, including malpractice — the fee simply must be reasonable under Rule 1.5, assessed case by case.
A consistent philosophy, not a coincidence
Rhode Island is among a small group of states with no statutory cap at all on medical malpractice damages against a private healthcare provider — no limit on economic, noneconomic, or punitive damages. That same uncapped philosophy carries through to attorney fees: nothing in Rhode Island law artificially constrains either side of a malpractice recovery.
Two separate things that sound related but aren't
It's worth being clear that Rhode Island's $100,000 cap on damages against a government entity has nothing to do with attorney fees. That cap limits what a plaintiff can recover from the government defendant; the attorney's own percentage fee, applied to whatever is actually recovered, remains governed entirely by Rule 1.5's separate reasonableness standard.
A distinctive combination among the states
Many states that leave personal injury fees uncapped still allow some form of damages cap, at least for medical malpractice. Rhode Island's combination — no fee cap, and essentially no damages cap against private defendants — places it among the more plaintiff-favorable jurisdictions nationally on both fronts simultaneously.