Banks v. Koehring Co.
| Decision Date | 16 June 1976 |
| Docket Number | No. 75-1733,75-1733 |
| Citation | 538 F.2d 176 |
| Parties | Gary R. BANKS, Appellee, v. KOEHRING COMPANY and Farm Division and/or Fox Tractor Division thereof, Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit |
Ross H. Sidney, Des Moines, Iowa, for appellant.
Lex Hawkins, Des Moines, Iowa, for appellee.
Before GIBSON, Chief Judge, HENLEY, Circuit Judge, and MEREDITH, Chief District Judge. *
The plaintiff, Gary R. Banks, brought this diversity action against the defendant, Koehring Company (Koehring), the manufacturer of a forage harvester and corn head attachment that injured the plaintiff in a farm accident. Koehring appeals from a judgment in the amount of $150,000 entered upon a jury verdict on plaintiff's claims of negligence and strict liability in tort under Iowa law. On this appeal, Koehring contends that the District Court 1 erred (1) in submitting to the jury the plaintiff's claims of negligence and strict liability and Koehring's respective affirmative defenses of contributory negligence and assumption of risk; and (2) in refusing to enter judgment n. o. v. for the defendant, or alternatively a new trial, on the grounds that the verdict is contrary to the jury instructions and not supported by substantial evidence. We affirm.
The evidence, viewed, as we must, in a light most favorable to the prevailing party, Illinois Central R.R. v. Stufflebean, 270 F.2d 801, 805 (8th Cir. 1959), reveals that on August 28, 1971, the plaintiff, in his field near Seymour, Iowa, was harvesting sorghum with a Model 3000 Forage Harvester attached to the rear of a Model 2CA Corn Head, both supplied by Koehring, a Wisconsin corporation. The plaintiff had used the harvester earlier in the summer, but had just purchased the corn head to be used with it for harvesting sorghum and other row crops into silage for himself and others. 2
On the day of the accident, the plaintiff, an experienced farmer, age 32, was testing the combined corn head and harvester for the first time. He had read the instruction manuals for both machines the previous day and carried them with him. However, when he commenced harvesting, he immediately encountered a problem that is commonly experienced with such equipment, the machines clogged. To alleviate the problem, as he had done in the past on similar machines, the plaintiff engaged a reversing mechanism, using a control accessible from his tractor seat, to dislodge the material, 3 but was not successful. He then turned the machine off, dismounted, pulled out the jammed stalks by hand, restarted the machine, and repeated the process until it cleared.
After proceeding another ten feet, the machine again clogged. Plaintiff turned the machine off, repeated the cleaning process and made some adjustments as instructed in the manuals. After he travelled another ten feet a third clog developed. He repeated the cleaning process again and encountered the same problem a fourth and fifth time after travelling about ten feet. While clearing the clog the fourth time he also replaced some "shear bolts" on the feed rollers that were severed by other parts when the machine reversed. Again, however, after about ten feet a sixth clog developed.
Ultimately, having made all adjustments suggested in the manuals, the plaintiff reasoned that in order to discover the cause of the clogging, he would have to observe the machine while it was operating. Thus, he throttled down and applied the brakes to the tractor but left the power takeoff running to continue powering the harvester. He went back and looked into the hopper through a large opening in the top, but his view of the paddle roll was obscured by a clog of protruding sorghum stalks. Then, with his left arm he reached in to brush back the stalks, intending only to look inside, not to unclog or adjust the machine while it was running. Suddenly, the stalks began to feed and pulled his arm into the paddle roll, causing severe injuries eventually requiring amputation of his arm.
The plaintiff specified, inter alia, that Koehring's design was negligent (1) in failing to incorporate a device, operable from the driver's seat, to unclog the machine by completely reversing the harvesting mechanism, (2) in failing to provide a shield or cover over the hopper to prevent injury in the paddle roll, and (3) in providing too wide a gap between the corn head's gathering chains so as to cause undue accumulation and clogging. He further alleged that Koehring failed to test the equipment, to provide unclogging instructions, and to adequately warn the user of the product's dangers. Plaintiff also alleged that these unreasonable defects in the product rendered Koehring strictly liable in tort under Iowa law.
In ruling on a motion for directed verdict in this case under Fed.R.Civ.P. 50(a), the evidence must be viewed in a light most favorable to the nonmovant and he must be given the benefit of all legitimate inferences, Little v. Watkins Motor Lines, 256 F.2d 145, 148 (8th Cir. 1958), without assessing credibility. Brady v. Southern Ry., 320 U.S. 476, 479, 64 S.Ct. 232, 88 L.Ed. 239 (1943). The motion must be denied if reasonable minds might differ as to the conclusions of fact to be drawn. Fort Dodge Hotel Co. v. Bartelt, 119 F.2d 253, 257 (8th Cir. 1941). In considering a motion for judgment n. o. v. under Fed.R.Civ.P. 50(b), the same view of the evidence is taken, 5A J. Moore, Federal Practice P 50.07(2), at 2355-56 (2d ed. 1975), and the verdict must be sustained if there is substantial evidence to support it. Simpson v. Skelly Oil Co., 371 F.2d 563, 567 (8th Cir. 1967).
After carefully reviewing the record with these principles in mind, we believe the District Court properly submitted all issues to the jury and correctly refused to set the verdict aside. There was substantial evidence to support the plaintiff's claim that Koehring was negligent in failing to exercise reasonable care in design, Bengford v. Carlem Corp., 156 N.W.2d 855, 864 (Iowa 1968); Calkins v. Sandven, 256 Iowa 682, 688, 129 N.W.2d 1, 5-7 (1964), and in failing to test the product for clogging, cf. West v. Broderick & Bascom Rope Co., 197 N.W.2d 202, 212-13 (Iowa 1972), as well as failing to provide the buyer with "reasonable notice and specific direction as to proper use and all attendant risks which are forseeable to a manufacturer who possesses superior knowledge." Buffington v. Amchem Products, Inc., 489 F.2d 1053, 1055 (8th Cir. 1974) (emphasis in original), citing Lakatosh v. Diamond Alkali Co., 208 N.W.2d 910, 913 (Iowa 1973). The defendant's engineer, Mr. Sousek, conceded that harvesting machines of this type generally provide complete reversal devices, or at least avoid internal countermovement, that Koehring did not thoroughly test the machines for clogging and that the instruction...
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