How this estimate is built
Your medical expenses and lost wages are your economic damages, never capped in Maryland. We apply the multiplier method, the industry-standard approach, to estimate noneconomic damages — then check the result against whichever cap applies.
Pure contributory negligence: any fault can bar the claim
Maryland is one of only a handful of US jurisdictions — alongside the District of Columbia and Virginia — that still follows pure contributory negligence. If your own negligence actually contributed to causing the incident, you can be barred from recovering anything at all, regardless of how much more at fault the other party was. One real limitation: your conduct has to have actually caused the harm — simply being careless in some unrelated way isn't the same as legally contributing to the accident.
Two separate noneconomic damages caps
Maryland runs two genuinely distinct cap schedules. For an ordinary personal injury or wrongful death case, Md. Code, Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 11-108 caps noneconomic damages at $965,000 for causes of action arising between October 1, 2025 and September 30, 2026, rising by $15,000 every October 1. Medical malpractice runs on its own lower schedule under § 3-2A-09: $920,000 for 2026, rising by $15,000 every January 1 instead.
Wrongful death multiplies the cap, but not by the same amount
Where there are two or more wrongful death beneficiaries, the general track's cap rises to 150% of the standard figure. The medical malpractice track's multiplier is lower: just 125%. This is a genuinely distinctive difference between the two tracks, not just the base dollar amount.
Economic and punitive damages remain uncapped
Neither cap touches economic damages or punitive damages. The jury is never told about either cap during trial.