Interstate Engineering, Inc. v. Burnette

• Decision Date: 28 June 1985
• Citation: 474 So.2d 624
• Parties: INTERSTATE ENGINEERING, INC. v. Janelle K. BURNETTE. 82-1131.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Page 624

474 So.2d 624

INTERSTATE ENGINEERING, INC. v. Janelle K. BURNETTE.

82-1131.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

June 28, 1985.

Richard B. Garrett of Rushton, Stakely, Johnston & Garrett, Montgomery, for appellant.

Sterling G. Culpepper, Jr., David R. Boyd, and William P. Cobb II of Balch, Bingham, Baker, Ward, Smith, Bowman & Thagard, Montgomery, for appellee.

EMBRY, Justice.

This appeal by Interstate Engineering, Inc., a corporation, is from a judgment entered on a jury verdict of $200,000 in favor of Janelle K. Burnette, administratrix of the estate of James Kenneth Burnette, deceased, as damages for the wrongful death of her son and intestate, Kenneth Burnette.

Kenneth died from inhalation of carbon monoxide fumes generated by a fire that destroyed the home of his mother and his father, William J. Burnette, on 13 February 1981. Suit was filed under the theory of Alabama's Extended Manufacturer's Liability Doctrine.

Interstate claims error in the denial of its motion for directed verdict, motion for new trial or, in the alternative, motion for JNOV, motion for remittitur, and the giving of a jury instruction regarding the sudden emergency doctrine.

The thrust of plaintiff's case is that certain heat sensors manufactured by Interstate were defective and failed to respond, and signal, at 136 degrees Fahrenheit as they were designed to do.

In order to resolve the issues, it is necessary to state the tendencies of the evidence: Kenneth Barnette died from smoke inhalation when he failed to escape the burning home. About four years before the fire, the Burnettes bought three heat detectors and one smoke detector manufactured by Interstate. The heat detector located in Kenneth's bedroom is that which gave rise to this action. These devices were not altered or unpackaged before the sale of them to the Burnettes. They were installed by a salesman of the seller who had been trained by Interstate's representative to sell and install these products.

An instructional manual entitled "Safe at Home" accompanied the detectors when delivered to the Burnettes. The detectors required no maintenance. Regular testing of the devices was encouraged by Interstate and done by the Burnettes as recently as one month before the fire.

The heat detector in question, a Vanguard Thermosonic Model V-50 FT, was a mechanically operated unit, powered by a coiled spring motor, and designed to make a loud, school-bell or burglar-alarm sound. A Model V-50 FT was activated in a demonstration conducted before the jury; the jury heard the loud alarm which the detector in Ken's bedroom was designed to sound. In the presence of a temperature of 136 degrees Fahrenheit, a round heat-sensitive sensor on the front of the device should melt, releasing the coiled spring and activating the alarm.

At approximately 12:45 on the morning of the fatal fire, Janelle Burnette's husband awakened and told her the house was on fire. Neither the smoke detector, located in the hallway, nor the three heat detectors (located in the kitchen, guest bedroom, and Kenneth's bedroom respectively) had activated to sound an alarm up to the time Mr. and Mrs. Burnette awakened.

Mrs. Burnette got out of bed and entered the adjoining hallway. She looked down the hall in the direction of the dining room and Kenneth's bedroom, in the presence of thick dark smoke, and saw flames in the ceiling of the dining room and in the hallway, directly adjacent to Kenneth's bedroom door. The top of the separating wall between his bedroom and the dining room was also in flames and flames were coming down through the ceiling. The heat detector in Kenneth's bedroom was located within a few inches of the ceiling, approximately two feet from his bedroom door, and immediately adjacent to the visible flames in the dining room, hallway, and separating wall area. Despite its proximity to the flames, the heat detector in Kenneth's room did not sound an alarm. Neither did the heat detector in the kitchen.

The location of the smoke and flames provoked his father to call Kenneth, who answered. Mrs. Burnette turned, spoke briefly to her husband, and began leaving the house. While she made her way out, her husband again called out to Kenneth to say "Let's go, this house is going fast, let's get out of here." To this second call of warning from his father, Kenneth gave no reply.

While Mrs. Burnette was making her way out of the house, the heat detector in the guest bedroom went off. This was the first alarm sounded. The heat detector in Kenneth's bedroom still had not activated. However, the flames were adjacent to the detector in Kenneth's room and closer to it than to the detector in the guest bedroom.

After exiting the house, Mrs. Burnette went for help. Sometime after 1:15 a.m., after the Burnettes had once attempted to re-enter the burning house but were unable to do so because of the extent of the fire, the first volunteer fireman, Edward Terrell, arrived. At that time, more than thirty minutes after the Burnettes had awakened, the house was ablaze. As fire and smoke came underneath the eaves and through the gables all across the house, other people began to arrive. Unable to work the fire truck, they moved a car parked in front of the guest bedroom, for fear of it exploding, then stood back and watched the house burn.

By this time, the house was described as "bubbling," "boiling," and "caving in." The crowd stood 75 to 100 feet back from the house because of the heat, as a witness said, "far away from it so that the heat wouldn't blister you." Then, as the house burned out of control, twenty to thirty minutes after Edward Terrell arrived, and as much as one hour after the heat detector in the guest bedroom went off, a second heat detector went off. This alarm was not sounding when Terrell arrived, he had not heard any prior alarm go off, and there is no evidence that any other alarms, other than the one in the guest bedroom, that went off approximately one hour earlier, were ever activated. All the detectors were completely destroyed in the fire.

Mrs. Burnette testified the heat detectors were tested properly and regularly but not under heat or fire conditions. The testing is to ensure the detector is wound and the spring loaded. The test does not indicate whether the detector will adequately respond to heat or fire. Based on the recommended testing of the product, one cannot know whether the detector will actually perform its intended function and alarm a person in the presence of high temperatures.

Interstate challenges both the sufficiency and the weight of the evidence, by motion for a directed verdict, motion for a new trial or, in the alternative, a motion for JNOV. Accordingly, the appropriate standards of review, presented respectively, are whether the evidence, when viewed in a light most favorable to the non-moving party, furnishes any support for the theory of the complaint and whether the judgment entered, based on the weight and sufficiency of the evidence presented, is palpably wrong or manifestly unjust. Casey v. Jones, 410 So.2d 5 (Ala.1981); Chavers v. National Security Fire and Casualty Co., 405 So.2d 1 (Ala.1981).

Relying principally upon Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Haven Hills Farm, Inc., 395 So.2d 991 (Ala.1981), Interstate argues a directed verdict should have been entered in that plaintiff failed to prove any defect in the heat detectors. In support of this argument, Interstate emphasizes the absence of any expert...