Cite as: 538 U. S. 408 (2003)
Ginsburg, J., dissenting
als on file in its historical department as of 1988, even though these documents could have been preserved at minimal expense. Ibid. Fortuitously, the Campbells obtained a copy of the 1979 PP&R manual by subpoena from a former employee. Id., at 132a. Although that manual has been requested in other cases, State Farm has never itself produced the document. Ibid.
"As a final, related tactic," the trial court stated, the jury could reasonably find that "in recent years State Farm has gone to extraordinary lengths to stop damaging documents from being created in the first place." Id., at 126a. State Farm kept no records at all on excess verdicts in third-party cases, or on bad-faith claims or attendant verdicts. Ibid. State Farm alleged "that it has no record of its punitive damage payments, even though such payments must be reported to the [Internal Revenue Service] and in some states may not be used to justify rate increases." Ibid. Regional Vice President Buck Moskalski testified that "he would not report a punitive damage verdict in [the Campbells'] case to higher management, as such reporting was not set out as part of State Farm's management practices." Ibid.
State Farm's "wrongful profit and evasion schemes," the trial court underscored, were directly relevant to the Campbells' case, id., at 132a:
"The record fully supports the conclusion that the bad-faith claim handling that exposed the Campbells to an excess verdict in 1983, and resulted in severe damages to them, was a product of the unlawful profit scheme that had been put in place by top management at State Farm years earlier. The Campbells presented substantial evidence showing how State Farm's improper insistence on claims-handling employees' reducing their claim payouts . . . regardless of the merits of each claim, manifested itself . . . in the Utah claims operations during the period when the decisions were made not to offer to settle the Campbell case for the $50,000 policy limits—
435
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