Campos v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co.

• Decision Date: 21 December 1984
• Citation: 485 A.2d 305,98 N.J. 198
• Parties: Armando CAMPOS and Puresa Campos, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The FIRESTONE TIRE & RUBBER COMPANY, Defendant-Respondent.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

Page 198

98 N.J. 198

485 A.2d 305

Armando CAMPOS and Puresa Campos, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The FIRESTONE TIRE & RUBBER COMPANY, Defendant-Respondent.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Argued Oct. 22, 1984.

Decided Dec. 21, 1984.

William H. Sheil, Maplewood, for plaintiffs-appellants.

Erwin N. Griswold, Washington, D.C., a member of the District of Columbia bar, for defendant-respondent (Ribis, McCluskey, Ruane & Graham, Short Hills, attorneys; Jerome J. Graham, Jr., Short Hills, of counsel; and George C. Jones, Short Hills, on brief).

Joseph A. Gervasi, Roseland, submitted a letter in lieu of brief on behalf of amicus curiae National Machine Tool Builders' Ass'n (Young, Rose & Millspaugh, Roseland, attorneys).

The opinion of the Court was delivered by

SCHREIBER, J.

This failure-to-warn product liability case presents for consideration the effect of a foreseeable user's knowledge of a danger on a manufacturer's responsibility to distribute a product free from defect. Does that knowledge eliminate any duty to warn? Or is it a link to be considered on whether the failure to warn was a substantial factor in causing the accident and injuries?

Plaintiff Armando Campos ¹ was born and raised in Portugal. He emigrated to this country in 1971. Shortly after his arrival in the United States he obtained a job with Theurer Atlantic, Inc. (Theurer), a manufacturer of truck trailers.

In connection with its trailer operation Theurer placed new truck tires on rims before their installation on the trailers. Plaintiff's work was to assemble the tires. This involved placing a tire containing an inner tube on a three-piece rim assembly, putting the assembled tire into a steel safety cage designed to prevent injuries in case the assembled parts separated under pressure, and then inserting air into the tire by inflating the tube inside it. He generally worked a five-day, forty-hour week, and assembled about eight tires an hour. Plaintiff's employment continued in this manner until the accident on November 1, 1978.

About 9:30 a.m. on that day, plaintiff was readying a new Dunlop tire to be mounted on a trailer. He assembled the three-piece rim and tire, placed the tire in the cage, and clamped the air pressure hose into place so that air was being forced into the tire. He then noticed that a locking element on the rim components was opening. Fearing that there would "be a very big accident" if the pieces separated under pressure, he immediately tried to disengage the hose. He explained, "Because if I didn't, it could kill me and kill everybody that was around there." As he reached into the cage, the assembly exploded and plaintiff was severely injured.

Defendant, Firestone Tire & Rubber Company, had manufactured the rim assembly. We were advised at oral argument that Theurer, not defendant, had made the protective cage. Defendant had delivered manuals describing the proper method of preparing the tire to its customers, including Theurer. Defendant had also given Theurer a large chart prepared by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the United States Department of Transportation. That chart was kept on the wall at the Theurer shop and contained instructions on safety precautions, including the following advice: "ALWAYS INFLATE TIRE IN SAFETY CAGE OR USE A PORTABLE LOCK RING GUARD. USE A CLIP-ON TYPE AIR CHUCK ² WITH REMOTE VALVE SO THAT OPERATOR CAN STAND CLEAR DURING TIRE INFLATION." However, Campos could not read or write Portuguese or English and these written warnings were therefore ineffective.

In addition to the written instructions, plaintiff had received some oral instructions from his supervisor. He had been told that a truck tire was to be placed in the cage before inflating it. Further, he had had a similar accident in July, 1972, when, to prevent a mishap, he had inserted his hand into the protective cage while air was being blown into the tire. The injuries that he received then were less severe than in this accident.

Plaintiff proceeded against defendant, Firestone Tire & Rubber Company, on two strict liability theories, improper design and failure to warn. His contention that the rim had been improperly designed because it should have consisted of one rather than three pieces was rejected by the jury. His second claim, which was accepted by the jury, was that defendant had not adequately warned him of the danger and that that failure to warn was a proximate cause of his injury. The jury returned a verdict of $255,000.

Defendant appealed. A divided Appellate Division reversed and entered judgment for the defendant. See 192 N.J.Super. 251, 469 A.2d 943 (1983). This Court granted plaintiff's petition for certification. 96 N.J. 310, 475 A.2d 600 (1984).

I

We recently observed that the defect in a strict liability action may consist of a manufacturing flaw, a design defect, or an inadequate warning. Feldman v. Lederle Laboratories, 97 N.J. 429, 449, 479 A.2d 374 (1984). Plaintiff did not allege the existence of a manufacturing flaw and his claim of a design defect has been rejected by the jury. The propriety of that rejection is not before us. What is before us is plaintiff's assertion that the warning given was inadequate.

Plaintiff's expert suggested that defendant should have produced a graphic or symbolic warning against inserting one's hand in the protective cage during the inflation process. He thought that it would have been appropriate to have prepared a sign containing a symbol similar to the picture of a cigarette with a diagonal red line across that informs one not to smoke. He testified that the manufacturer should have anticipated that illiterate people would be exposed to these dangers and added, "we have to do things which will protect them as well."

Although plaintiff's similar accident six years earlier may have served as some warning against reaching into the cage while the tire was being inflated, plaintiff's expert stated that plaintiff's "instinctive" reaction was to try to stop the accident by inserting his hand into the cage. Plaintiff's expert responded as follows to a question regarding how symbols would have helped the plaintiff avoid the accident:

A. Not very much. A little perhaps. That is, if there was a reminder in graphical form against putting his hands in telling him that explosive separations can take place, and he's instructed verbally by somebody in his own native tongue as to what that symbol means. Then at least that amount of information has been provided to him.

I don't think it's going to be very effective beyond a certain point because this particular incident situationally starts before the tire even gets into the cage. It starts either on the assembly line or it starts when the man is assembling it and doesn't assemble it correctly. I certainly agree that the warning graphical which the man let's say understands is not--it's better than nothing, but not very much better.

Q. Is it better than the pain caused by a prior injury in terms of suppressing his instincts for putting his hands in the cage?

A. No.

The Appellate Division majority and dissenting opinions viewed the effect of this evidence differently. The majority relied on the proposition that "there is no duty to warn where the danger is obvious and the user knowledgeable." 192 N.J.Super. at 267, 469 A.2d 943. It concluded that this was such a case and held that there being no duty to warn this plaintiff, plaintiff's case necessarily failed. The dissent, acknowledging that the "fact that the danger may have been [objectively] obvious [could] affect the [manufacturer's] duty," id., 192 N.J.Super. at 267, 469 A.2d 943, contended that the particular plaintiff's subjective knowledge is relevant on the issue of proximate cause rather than duty, id., 192 N.J.Super. at 269, 469 A.2d 943. The dissent concluded that since the trial court's charge on proximate cause had consisted only of general principles without relating them to the factual circumstances, the cause should be remanded for a new trial. Id., 192 N.J.Super. at 270-71, 469 A.2d 943.

The duty to warn in the strict liability cause of action is based on the notion that absent a warning or adequate warning, a product is defective, in that it is not reasonably fit, suitable, or safe for its intended purposes. Freund v. Cellofilm Properties, Inc., 87 N.J. 229, 242, 432 A.2d 925 (1981). In testing the need and adequacy of a warning, the manufacturer is deemed to know the dangerousness of the product. It is with that knowledge assumed that the manufacturer's conduct is to be gauged. Feldman, supra, 97 N.J. at 450, 479 A.2d 374; Freund, supra, 87 N.J. at 240, 432 A.2d 925; Phillips v. Kimwood Mach. Co., 269 Or. 485, 498, 525 P.d 1033, 1039 (1974); 2 L. Frumer & M. Friedman, Products Liability § 16A[f][iv][B], at 3B-136.2(g) (1976). The adequacy of the warning is to be evaluated in terms of what the manufacturer actually knew and what he "should have * * * known based on information that was reasonably available or obtainable and [that] should have alerted a reasonably prudent person to act." Feldman, supra, 97 N.J. at 452, 479 A.2d 374. In this case there is no dispute that the manufacturer had actual knowledge of the risk. Freund, supra, 87 N.J. at 243, 432 A.2d 925.

Generally, the duty to warn extends only to foreseeable users of the product and to uses that reasonably should have been objectively anticipated. "Fundamental to the determination of a products liability case, including one predicated on a defective design or inadequate warning, is the duty of the manufacturer to foreseeable users." O'Brien v. Muskin Corp., 94 N.J. 169, 180, 463 A.2d 298 (1983). If the use of the product is beyond its intended or reasonably anticipated scope (thereby not being probative of whether the product was fit, suitable, and safe), there may be no duty to warn. See Brown v. United States Stove Co., 98 N.J. 155, 168, 484 A.2d 1234 (1984)....