Granger v. Fruehauf Corp.
| Decision Date | 10 September 1987 |
| Docket Number | 78128,Docket Nos. 78121 |
| Parties | William GRANGER, Plaintiff-Appellant-Appellee, v. FRUEHAUF CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee-Appellant. 429 Mich. 1, 412 N.W.2d 199, Prod.Liab.Rep.(CCH)P. 11,566 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
Lopatin, Miller, Freedman, Bluestone, Erlich, Rosen and Bartnick, by Richard E. Shaw, Detroit, for plaintiff-appellant-appellee.
Plunkett, Cooney, Rutt, Watters, Stanczyk & Pedersen, P.C. by John P. Jacobs, Ernest R. Bazzana, Detroit, for defendant-appellee-appellant.
In this case we decide whether the jury's finding that the defendant was negligent is legally inconsistent with its finding that the defendant did not breach an implied warranty of fitness. We hold that the verdicts are not inconsistent. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and reinstate the judgment of the Wayne Circuit Court.
Plaintiff William Granger began this products liability action in Wayne Circuit Court in 1980, claiming injuries due to an alleged design defect in a trailer manufactured by defendant Fruehauf Corporation in 1969 and purchased by the plaintiff's employer in 1975. The plaintiff advanced claims on the basis of negligence and breach of an implied warranty of fitness.
The jury found for the defendant as to the plaintiff's warranty theory, but returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff on the negligence claim. The defendant contends that the verdict of the jury is fatally inconsistent. Because the particular underlying facts are important to our resolution of this issue, we set them forth in detail.
The high-side, open-top trailer at the center of this dispute was manufactured by the defendant corporation in 1969 for a particular customer, an interstate motor carrier. The stainless steel trailer was described as being forty feet long, with double rear doors. The top of the trailer was approximately twelve feet from the ground. Such trailers are used to haul oversize cargo, i.e., cargo that is higher than the sides of the trailer, and to facilitate loading and unloading by means of a crane.
The defendant regained possession of the trailer at some point and, in 1975, resold the unit to Standard Lead Company. The plaintiff, a long-distance truckdriver for Standard Lead, also performed other jobs for the company. Important to this case, those other duties included selecting the trailer at issue and signing the purchase order. The sales contract provided that the trailer was being sold "as is."
The plaintiff alleged that he was injured on March 20, 1978, when he fell from the trailer while delivering a load of loose copper turnings (shavings) to a metal refining plant in New Jersey. According to the plaintiff, he had to climb on top of the cargo to unroll the protective tarp in preparation for unloading. Since the trailer was not equipped with a ladder, he used other means to reach the tarp.
As the plaintiff explained, he hooked the right rear door in an open position and then began his climb by stepping first onto the bumper, then onto the trailer bed, and then onto the left door handle. At that point, in order to reach the top of the trailer, he had to push his feet into the loose copper.
According to the plaintiff, it took him about thirty minutes to unroll the tarp. During that time, a light snow turned heavy. As he was dismounting, his foot slipped on the left door handle and he fell seven or eight feet to the asphalt, striking the back of his head, his right shoulder, and his right arm.
The plaintiff said he lay on the ground for a couple of minutes and then went inside. He slept for about three-quarters of an hour, until the actual unloading began. He did not tell anyone at the refinery about his fall or injury. After sleeping eight or nine hours at a New Jersey truck center, he returned to Standard Lead via Rochester, New York, where he picked up another load.
The plaintiff alleged that as a result of his fall, he suffered a herniation or a rupture of a cervical disc. He was treated by numerous doctors and eventually underwent surgery--a cervical laminectomy--in 1979.
Trial was held in August, 1983. The plaintiff's theory, essentially, was that the trailer was negligently designed because it was not equipped with a ladder or other means of access to its top. He also theorized that the design defect constituted a breach of an implied warranty of fitness.
The defendant's theory included several points. Defendant maintained that there was no proof that the alleged accident happened the way the plaintiff said or, in fact, that it occurred at all; that neither custom nor standards called for ladders on such trailers in 1969, when the one at issue was manufactured; and that the plaintiff purchased the trailer in 1975 "as is," i.e., without a ladder. The defendant contended that because of the plaintiff's many years of experience both in selecting trailers and in using them on the road, he ought to be considered negligent for not requesting a ladder if he thought one was necessary.
The jury was given a special verdict form. The jurors agreed with the plaintiff that the defendant had been negligent. They also concluded that the plaintiff's own negligence had contributed to his accident. Accordingly, the jury reduced the $500,000 award by fifty percent.
The defendant appealed as of right. In a unanimous opinion dated November 18, 1985, the Court of Appeals set aside the jury verdict and ordered a new trial. 147 Mich.App. 190, 383 N.W.2d 162 (1985). Relying on this Court's decision in Prentis v. Yale Mfg. Co., 421 Mich. 670, 365 N.W.2d 176 (1984), the Court of Appeals reasoned that the jury's verdicts of negligence but no breach of warranty were legally inconsistent. The Court rejected the defendant's challenges to several other trial court rulings. The plaintiff's motion for rehearing was denied.
This Court granted both the plaintiff's and the defendant's applications for leave to appeal, in a single order dated July 23, 1986. 425 Mich 879.
In Prentis, the plaintiff sought damages for injuries suffered in an accident involving a forklift. As in the instant case, the plaintiff's claims included negligence and breach of implied warranty on the basis of an alleged design defect. The trial court refused to instruct the jury on breach of warranty, but did instruct on the theory of negligent design. The jury returned a verdict of no cause of action. The Court of Appeals reversed on the ground that the warranty instruction should have been given.
This Court reinstated the trial court's judgment, holding that where a products liability action against a manufacturer is based upon defective design, the jury need only be instructed on a single unified theory of negligent design. 1 We noted that prior attempts by the courts of this state "to avoid both the notion of fault implicit in negligence and the harshness of no-fault implicit in absolute liability" may have caused juror confusion in cases against manufacturers "based upon allegations of defective design," Prentis, supra, at 691, 365 N.W.2d 176. We said in Prentis that because the plaintiff's evidence and proofs at trial had focused on the single claim that the defendant "defectively" designed a forklift by failing to provide a slat or platform, the factual inquiry and the legal inquiry were indistinguishable. We concluded in that context that the trial court's refusal to instruct on breach of warranty was not error requiring reversal.
Mindful both of the need to preserve the vitality of the implied warranty theory of liability and of the infinite variety of circumstances which might be presented to a trial court, we carefully limited our opinion in Prentis. The Court of Appeals and the defendant believe, however, that our reasoning requires setting aside the jury's verdict here. The plaintiff argues that Prentis does not mandate that result.
We agree with the plaintiff. First, we note that the instant case is in a different procedural posture than was Prentis. In the latter, the trial court had refused to instruct on breach of an implied warranty, and the jury found no cause of action as to negligent design. The issue was whether the failure to instruct on warranty was error. Here, however, the trial court gave the breach of implied warranty instruction, but the jury grounded liability only on negligence.
In Prentis, we noted that because breach of an implied warranty of fitness in a design defect case is essentially a matter of negligence, the focus is on whether the manufacturer exercised reasonable care and reasonable safety. We observed that a trial court instruction on breach of warranty as well as on negligent design "would have been repetitive and unnecessary and could have misled the jury into believing that plaintiff could recover on the warranty count even if it found there was no 'defect' in the design of the product." Id., at 691-692, 365 N.W.2d 176. In the instant case, however, there is no such concern because the jury found a "defect," i.e., it found "negligence." Thus, while the issue in Prentis was the propriety of a unified instruction, the issue here is whether the jury verdict is supportable. If there is an interpretation of the evidence that provides a logical explanation for the findings of the jury, the verdict is not inconsistent.
The critical distinction between this case and Prentis is that the defendant here both manufactured and later resold the trailer to the plaintiff. The jury, therefore, could have found as to the intervening sale that the "as is" disclaimer negated any claim for breach of warranty, but that the defendant was negligent in the original design of the trailer.
Throughout the trial, the defendant emphasized that the plaintiff had expertise in buying trailers that the ordinary truckdriver did not have. 2 This expertise stemmed not only from the plaintiff's duties at Standard Lead,...
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