DuRocher v. Riddell, Inc.

• Decision Date: 31 March 2015
• Docket Number: No. 1:13–cv–01570–SEB–DML.,1:13–cv–01570–SEB–DML.
• Citation: 97 F.Supp.3d 1006
• Parties: John DuROCHER individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, Darin Harris individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs, v. RIDDELL, INC., All American Sports Corporation doing business as Riddell/All American, Riddell Sports Group, Inc., Easton–Bell Sports, Inc., Easton–Bell Sports, LLC, EB Sports Corporation, Rbg Holdings Corporation, Kranos Corporation doing business as Schutt Sports, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Indiana

97 F.Supp.3d 1006

John DuROCHER individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, Darin Harris individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs

v.RIDDELL, INC., All American Sports Corporation doing business as Riddell/All American, Riddell Sports Group, Inc., Easton–Bell Sports, Inc., Easton–Bell Sports, LLC, EB Sports Corporation, Rbg Holdings Corporation, Kranos Corporation doing business as Schutt Sports, Defendants.

No. 1:13–cv–01570–SEB–DML.

United States District Court, S.D. Indiana, Indianapolis Division.

Signed March 31, 2015.

David B. Franco, James Dugan, The Dugan Law Firm, New Orleans, LA, Don Barrett, Barrett Law Office PA, Lexington, MS, Elizabeth J. Cabraser, Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, San Francisco, CA, Irwin B. Levin, Lynn A. Toops, Richard E. Shevitz, Scott D. Gilchrist, Vess Allen Miller, Cohen & Malad LLP, Indianapolis, IN, Wendy Ruth Fleishman, Lieff Cabrasher Heimann & Bernstein LLP, New York, NY, for Plaintiffs.

Mark S. Mester, Latham & Watkins LLP, Chicago, IL, Cary A. Slobin, Bowman & Brooke, LLP, Dallas, TX, Paul Cereghini, Bowman & Broke LLP, Phoenix, AZ, Randall R. Riggs, Frost Brown Todd LLC, Indianapolis, IN, Robert Latane Wise, Bowman and Brooke LLP, Richmond, VA, for Defendants.

ORDER ON DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO DISMISS PLAINTIFFS' SECOND AMENDED COMPLAINT [DKT. NO. 76]

SARAH EVANS BARKER, District Judge.

I. Introduction.

Defendants, collectively referred to as Riddell, move to dismiss Plaintiffs John DuRocher and Darin Harris's Second Amended Complaint (SAC) in its entirety. Plaintiffs assert four claims for relief in their SAC: (1) Medical Monitoring; (2) Negligence; (3) Strict Liability for Design Defect; and (4) Strict Liability for Manufacturing Defect. [SAC ¶¶ 164–94.] For the following reasons, Defendants' Motion to Dismiss [Dkt. No. 76] is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART.

II. Background and Procedural History.

Defendants provide a thorough summary of the facts as alleged in the SAC and Plaintiffs do not contest the facts as described by the Defendants. We take those facts as controlling in ruling on the motion to dismiss.

A. DuRocher's and Harris's Head Injuries.

Plaintiffs John DuRocher and Darin Harris are former University of Washington football players. [SAC ¶¶ 13–17.] Both Plaintiffs allege that they suffered concussions and repeated head impacts while playing college football and wearing helmets manufactured by Riddle. [Id. ¶¶ 13–17.]

Mr. DuRocher was a student at the University of Oregon as well as the University of Washington. [Id. ¶ 13.] Mr. DuRocher played college football as a quarterback from 2003–2006, during the course of which he experienced repeated traumatic head impacts. [Id. ] As Plaintiffs explain, during one game Mr. DuRocher sustained a hit that left him immediately lightheaded and dizzy. [Id. ] He was removed from the game and diagnosed with a concussion. [Id. ] Following his graduation, Mr. DuRocher has experienced frequent, severe headaches. [Id. ]

Mr. Harris played college football at the University of Washington from 2004 to 2008 in the position of strong safety and with the special teams unit. [Id. ¶ 15.] Mr. Harris alleges that he experienced “repeated traumatic head impacts” during his college football career. [Id. ¶ 16.] During a football game in 2007, he sustained an impact injury to his head in which he was “blindsided and experienced lightheadedness and dizziness.” [Id. ] He recalls returning to play when the defense next took the field. Mr. Harris recalls incurring another “severe impact to the head” in a 2008 football game, after which he was diagnosed with a concussion. [Id. ] Following the conclusion of his football career, Mr. Harris has experienced “frequent severe headaches, memory loss, an inability to concentrate or focus, anxiety, and depression.” [Id. ]

Both Messrs. DuRocher and Harris allege that they have suffered “other similar head impacts” while playing football in college, but neither can recall the incidents with specificity. [Id. ¶¶ 13, 16.] They both also allege that “[u]pon information and belief,” they each “wore Riddle helmets while playing and/or practicing during their collegiate football careers.” [Id. ¶¶ 122, 14, 17.]

B. The Dangers of Head Injuries and Development of Helmet Standards.

Plaintiffs allege that the medical community and more recently the general public have for some time recognized the risks of repeated concussions and head impacts, including a “heightened risk of long[-]term, chronic neuro-cognitive sequela” as a result of those impacts. [Id. ¶ 29.] According to Plaintiffs, the medical community has “known about concussions and the effects of concussions in football for over a century.” [Id. ¶ 30.]

Plaintiffs cite various scientific studies documenting that repeated traumatic head impacts cause ongoing microscopic and latent brain injury, which can cause an early onset of Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, dementia, depression, deficits in cognitive functioning, reduced processing speed, attention, and reasoning, loss of memory, sleeplessness, mood swings, personality changes, and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. [Id. ¶¶ 39, 40.] This information, they assert, has been widely and publicly available since the 1980s, within research groups, universities, and other organizations who published their findings on concussions and head impacts between the 1980s and the 2000s. [Id. ¶¶ 56–76.] During the early 1990s, the sports-medicine community developed “return-to-play criteria for football players suspected of having sustained head injuries.” [Id. ¶ 61.] In 1996, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (“NCAA”) also studied concussions, including through its Sports Science Safety Subcommittee on Competitive Safeguards and Medical Aspects of Sports, having recognized that “the football helmet would not prevent concussions.” [Id. ¶ 63.]

In 1969, stakeholders in helmet safety—including “manufacturers, reconditioners, athletic trainers, coaches, equipment managers, sports medicine doctors, and consumer organizations”—formed the National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment (NOCSAE). [Id. ¶¶ 83–85.] DuRocher and Harris explain: “The goal of NOCSAE has been to improve athletic equipment, and to reduce injuries through creating standards for athletic equipment.” [Id. ¶ 84.] NOCSAE's efforts include “the development of performance standards for football helmets as well as research to better understand the mechanism and tolerance of head and neck injuries and the design and structure of football helmets.” [Id. ]

Since 1973, NOCSAE has issued football-helmet safety standards “that have been developed to reduce head injuries by establishing requirements for impact attenuation for football helmets and face masks and have been adopted by various regulatory bodies for sports, including the NCAA.” [Id. ¶ 86.] DuRocher and Harris acknowledge that a helmet certified to the NOCSAE standard provides “a substantial level of protection for serious head injuries, including concussions,” and that no helmet—not even one that meets or exceeds the NOCSAE standard—can prevent all concussions. [Id. ¶ 90.]

For decades, Riddell has designed, manufactured, and sold football helmets, including selling helmets directly “to colleges and universities around the United States.” [Id. ¶¶ 2, 121.] Since the 1940s, Riddell has introduced numerous advancements in football-helmet design, including air inflation to fit the helmet snugly, padding that uses foam and liquid-filled cells to absorb impact forces, and an “air-fitted liner system.” [Id. ¶ 121.] These advancements are in addition to several different design iterations and other safety technologies that were available when DuRocher and Harris played college football. [Id. ¶ 121(h)—(j).]

Before 2001, Riddell provided warnings on its helmets that read:

Do not use this helmet to butt, ram or spear an opposing player. This is in violation of the football rules and such use can result in severe head or neck injuries, paralysis or death to you and possible injury to your opponent. No helmet can prevent all head or neck injuries a player might receive while playing football.

[Id. ¶ 126.] Beginning in 2002, Riddell introduced a revised warning, to which DuRocher and Harris specifically refer (and thereby incorporate into the SAC by reference)¹ , which reads as follows:

[See id. ¶ 127; see also Decl. of P. Cereghini ¶ 2, Ex. 1.]

In addition to the 2002 warning, DuRocher and Harris describe different efforts at different times by Riddell and others to increase concussion awareness, such as Riddell's partnering in 2012 with USA Football, which included for the first time providing with each helmet “a hangtag offering concussion education that includes information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Heads Up program.” [Id. ¶ 130.]

Plaintiffs allege Defendants failed to warn Plaintiffs and other players that their helmets did not protect against the risks of latent long-term brain injury from repeated head impacts. [Id. ¶ 118.] Plaintiffs also allege that Defendants marketed their products in a way that misled “athletes, parents and coaches into a dangerous false sense of protection.” [Id. ¶ 114.] According to Plaintiffs, “[a] helmet certified to the standards of the NOCSAE does provide a substantial level of protection for serious head injuries, including concussions, but the NOCSAE concedes that its helmet standard is not a concussion standard, and no helmet can prevent all concussions, even those certified to the NOCSAE standard.” [Id. at 90.]

C. Plaintiffs' SAC.

On October 1, 2013, Plaintiffs filed their original Complaint [Dkt. No. 1] and have now amended it twice. [Dkt. Nos. 9, 71.] The operative complaint is the Second Amended Complaint filed on March 14, 2014, which sets out four claims against Defendants: medical monitoring, common-law negligence, and two strict liability claims, one for design defects and one for manufacturing defects. [...