American Cyanamid Co. v. Roy
| Decision Date | 23 October 1986 |
| Docket Number | No. 67124,67124 |
| Parties | , 11 Fla. L. Weekly 544, Prod.Liab.Rep. (CCH) P 11,166 AMERICAN CYANAMID CO., Petitioner, v. Lester K. ROY, Respondent. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Paul R. Regensdorf of Fleming, O'Bryan & Fleming, Ft. Lauderdale, for petitioner.
Don Lacy, Tallahassee, and Earle Lee Butler of Butler & Pettit, P.A., Ft. Lauderdale, for respondent.
James E. Tribble of Blackwell, Walker, Gray, Powers, Flick & Hoehl, Miami, amicus curiae for Florida Defense Lawyers Assn.
Edward T. O'Donnell of Mershon, Sawyer, Johnston, Dunwody & Cole, Miami, and David G. Owen, Columbia, S.C., amicus curiae for The Product Liability Advisory Council, Inc.
C. Rufus Pennington, III of Margol, Fryefield & Pennington, Jacksonville, amicus curiae for The Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers.
Rodney L. Tennyson, West Palm Beach, amicus curiae for The Florida Consumers Federation.
In American Cyanamid Co. v. Roy, 466 So.2d 1079 (Fla. 4th DCA 1984), the district court upheld the jury's verdict awarding plaintiff Roy punitive damages against defendant American Cyanamid Company (Cyanamid). We find conflict with our decision of White Construction Co., Inc. v. Dupont, 455 So.2d 1026 (Fla.1984), and so exercise our jurisdiction under article V, section 3(b)(3) of the Florida Constitution. We quash that portion of the opinion under review approving the imposition of punitive damages in this case.
Over a ten-year period, Roy worked in jobs requiring exposure to a Cyanamid product, AM-9, which consists of 95% acrylamide. While the social and industrial utility of the product as a waterproofing sewer grout is uncontested, the chemical of which it is made has been established as toxic. Extensive laboratory research and experience in the field has linked acrylamide to a variety of ills ranging from neuropathy and ataxia to severe skin conditions. Roy, suffering a number of disturbances to his nervous system and found partially disabled by an examining physician, sued Cyanamid on theories of a negligent failure to warn and breach of warranty involving fraud and misrepresentation, and sought punitive damages.
The jury returned a special verdict finding Cyanamid negligent in failing to properly warn, and found Roy comparatively negligent in "failing to read or heed warnings or in using the AM-9," and reduced his compensatory damages of $292,000 by thirty percent. The jury also found, relevant to this appeal, that Cyanamid had "committed a fraud or misrepresentation" in its action, and that "the acts of the defendant ... [were] done with malice, moral turpitude, wantonness, willfulness, or with reckless indifference to the rights of others." The jury heard evidence of Cyanamid's net worth of 1.5 billion dollars and awarded punitive damages of $45,000.
Cyanamid expresses deep frustration with the punitive damages awarded at trial and upheld upon appeal, contending that the imposition of such damages in this case lacks support in the case law and in public policy. Cyanamid argues that punitive damages are being routinely imposed in products liability suits without legal or factual justification. The award in this case, we believe, supports Cyanamid's contentions.
Even examining the evidence in a light most favorable to the plaintiff, and indulging every reasonable inference therefrom in the plaintiff's favor, as is required when the defendant moves for a directed verdict, Smith v. Brantley, 455 So.2d 1063 (Fla. 1st DCA 1984), rev. denied, 462 So.2d 1107 (Fla.1985), in no way can Cyanamid's corporate behavior in relationship to its product of AM-9 sustain the award of punitive damages against it. The trial court should have granted Cyanamid's motion for directed verdict on the question of punitive damages.
This Court has repeatedly emphasized that the twin purposes of punitive damages--punishment of the offender and deterrence of others who might otherwise act similarly, Mercury Motors Express, Inc. v. Smith, 393 So.2d 545 (Fla.1981); Lassitter v. International Union of Operating Engineers, 349 So.2d 622 (Fla.1976), are only served when the defendant's behavior transcends the level of simple negligence, and even gross negligence, U.S. Concrete Pipe Co. v. Bould, 437 So.2d 1061 (Fla.1983), and enters the realm of wanton intentionality, exaggerated recklessness, or such an extreme degree of negligence as to parallel an intentional and reprehensible act. This Court has repeatedly striven to mark the line at which point behavior becomes sufficiently culpable to merit societal sanction through the punishing imposition of such damages. We once again point to the line drawn in our opinion of White Construction, in which we noted that "the character of negligence necessary to sustain a conviction for manslaughter is the same as that required to sustain a recovery for punitive damages." 455 So.2d at 1028, quoting Carraway v. Revell, 116 So.2d 16, 20 (Fla.1959).
We repeat our observation in White limiting punitive damages to truly culpable behavior in order to emphasize that such damages, "reserved to those kinds of cases where private injuries partake of public wrongs," Ingram v. Pettit, 340 So.2d 922, 923-24 (Fla.1976), are assessed in a dramatically different manner than compensatory damages. Unlike the latter, punitive damages are in a sense explicitly based on juror emotion, in that one function of the award is to express society's collective outrage at unacceptable behavior. The damages awarded are therefore based not on the plaintiff's actual damages but upon the wealth of the defendant and the perceived need to punish and deter. See Lassiter, 349 So.2d at 626.
We therefore reiterate our observations in White urging restraint upon the courts in ensuring that the defendant's behavior represents more than even gross negligence prior to allowing the imposition of punitive damages, in order to ensure that the damages serve their proper function. While we remain hesitant to have trial courts routinely remove the question from the jury's consideration, we note that a directed verdict may properly be granted unless the evidence establishes that the behavior in question involves the following type of misconduct:
The character of negligence necessary to sustain an award of punitive damages must be of a "gross and flagrant character, evincing reckless disregard of human life, or of the safety of persons exposed to its dangerous effects, or there is that entire want of care which would raise the presumption of a conscious indifference to consequences, or...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Davis v. Singletary
... ... Later, as Petitioner notes, the prosecutor stated that "death is an awful subject," but "we live in a society that says that an American citizen, citizens of Florida, citizens of Jacksonville, have a right to be in their homes, have a right to be secured, to be safe." Id. at 1828 ... ...
-
Ziarko v. Soo Line R. Co.
...law). Colorado: White v. Hansen (Colo.1992), 837 P.2d 1229; Lira v. Davis (Colo.1992), 832 P.2d 240. Florida: American Cyanamid Co. v. Roy (1986), 498 So.2d 859; Tampa Electric Co. v. Stone & Webster Engineering Corp. (M.D. Fla.1973), 367 F.Supp. 27. Iowa: Godbersen v. Miller (Iowa 1989), 4......
-
Tallahassee Furniture Co., Inc. v. Harrison
...a reckless indifference to the rights of others which is equivalent to an intentional violation of those rights. See American Cyanamid Co. v. Roy, 498 So.2d 859 (Fla.1986); Como Oil Company, Inc. v. O'Loughlin, 466 So.2d 1061 (Fla.1985); White Construction Co. v. Dupont, 455 So.2d 1026, 102......
-
Sowers v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Nos. 18-11901
...the defendant and ‘as a deterrent to others.’ "). Compensatory damages are not designed to punish or to deter. Am. Cyanamid Co. v. Roy, 498 So. 2d 859, 861 (Fla. 1986) (Punitive damages "are assessed in a dramatically different manner than compensatory damages," and they are "based not on t......