Collateral Estoppel - Rationale

Rationale

Collateral estoppel is an efficiency rule that is meant to save judicial resources by avoiding the relitigation of issues of fact that have already been actually litigated. The rule is also intended to protect defendants from the inequity of having to defend the same issue repeatedly.

But note that the use of offensive non-mutual collateral estoppel may work against the goal of judicial economy. The offensive use encourages potential plaintiffs to sit and "test the waters" to see the strength of the defendant's case. If the defendant's case is weak, there is great incentive for new parties to sue and claim that the defendant is estopped based on the prior adverse ruling.