It is that time of year again. The American Tort Reform Foundation has published its annual Judicial Hellholes report evaluating jurisdictions “where judges in civil cases systematically apply laws and court procedures in an unfair and unbalanced manner.”
California as a state has long held the distinction of topping out the list either as the top “Judicial Hellhole” or at least in the top five due to its unjust, plaintiff-friendly civil justice system.
Citing a 2024 estimate from the The Perryman Group, ATRF notes, “California residents pay a “tort tax” of $2,458.33 (fourth highest in the nation) and 829,255 jobs are lost each year” due to lawsuit abuses and related costs. They note, “If California enacted specific reforms targeting lawsuit abuse, the state would increase its gross product by $95.8 billion.” Needless to say, that’s serious money.
But this year, it’s not California as a state topping the annual ranking, but rather Los Angeles. They explain, “The jurisdiction separated itself as the worst of the worst in 2025. It saw an eye-popping $1 billion nuclear verdict, fraud allegations exposing abusive litigation practices, and courts entertaining novel liability theories that expand defendants’ exposure. Small businesses remain frequent targets of predatory ADA lawsuits and other no-injury lawsuits, while ongoing attacks on arbitra- tion threaten an essential tool for resolving disputes fairly and efficiently.”
Readers of these pages are unlikely to be surprised by the fact that California, and the LA-area, remains a national hotbed of frivolous lawsuits filed around Americans with Disabilities Act claims. The state’s Unruh Civil Rights Act incentivizes such lawsuits with fines of $4,000 per violation, regardless of whether there was actual harm.
State Sen. Roger Niello, R-Roseville, introduced Senate Bill 84 this year giving businesses time to correct construction-related technical violations before being hit with such lawsuits. But as Niello explained in these pages in October, the bill stalled despite bipartisan support in Sacramento.
“Between January 1 and December 31, 2024, a total of 3,252 ADA Title III cases were filed in California — a more than 36% increase when com- pared with 2023. The Los Angeles–based SoCal Equal Access Group was responsible for nearly 80% of those filings at more than 2,590,” the report notes.
We encourage readers to visit judicialhellholes.org for the full report and explanation. Other jurisdictions flagged by the report include New York City, South Carolina, and St. Louis, underscoring that broken systems permeate the country.
These pages have long argued in support of civil justice reforms to rebalance the scales of justice. The civil justice system should exist for the purposes of justice, not for shaking down businesses or so some lawyers can afford extra yachts.