Knight v. Otis Elevator Co.
| Decision Date | 29 March 1979 |
| Docket Number | 78-1246,Nos. 78-1244,78-1245,s. 78-1244 |
| Citation | 596 F.2d 84 |
| Parties | 26 UCC Rep.Serv. 42, 4 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 73 Margaret Fisher KNIGHT, Appellant, v. OTIS ELEVATOR COMPANY and Hartford Insurance Group and Atwell, Vogel& Sterling, Inc., Appellees, v. WESTERN ELECTRIC COMPANY, Third-Party Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit |
Albert M. Hankin, Milford J. Meyer, Meyer, Lasch, Hankin & Poul, Philadelphia, Pa., Charles H. Weidner, Stevens & Lee, Reading, Pa., for appellant.
Thomas O. Malcolm, Michael Nelson Becci, Malcolm & Riley, West Chester, Pa., for appellee, Atwell, Vogel & Sterling, Inc.
Donald J. P. Sweeney, McWilliams, Sweeney & Powell, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellee, Hartford Ins. Group.
Harry A. Short, Jr., Kevin H. Smith, Liebert, Short, FitzPatrick & Lavin, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellee, Otis Elevator Co.
William J. O'Brien, Pepper, Hamilton & Scheetz, Philadelphia, Pa., for third-party defendant Western Elec. Co.
Before SEITZ, Chief Judge, and GIBBONS and HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judges.
This is a products liability case in which the plaintiff alleges she was injured when the door of a freight elevator in her employer's workplace prematurely closed and struck her. The plaintiff instituted an action against Otis Elevator Company, the designer, manufacturer and installer of the elevator; Hartford Insurance Group, which, as the insurer of the premises, had the statutory obligation 1 either to inspect the elevator or to choose a licensed firm to perform such inspections; and Atwell, Vogel & Sterling, Inc., ("AVS"), which had been hired by the Hartford Insurance Group to perform the inspections. The plaintiff's employer, Western Electric Company, was joined as a third-party defendant.
The central thesis of the plaintiff's case was that the freight elevator was in a defective condition because, by reason of improper design, manufacture and installation, the buttons or switches controlling the doors could be activated inadvertently and "they protruded beyond the wall and had no guards to prevent . . . accidental pushing . . ." 2 She thus claimed liability against Otis on the grounds of strict liability, breach of warranty and negligence and against Hartford and AVS on the grounds of negligence. At the close of the plaintiff's case on liability, defendants' motions for directed verdicts were granted. The plaintiff appeals from the orders directing verdicts for each defendant and also challenges two evidentiary rulings by the district court. The first of these was the district court's refusal to admit evidence against Otis of repairs made to the elevator by Western Electric Company subsequent to the accident. Second, the plaintiff challenges the district court's refusal to allow her expert witness to give an opinion on whether the elevator was defectively designed. We affirm the order directing verdicts for defendants Hartford Insurance Group and AVS. We also affirm the district court's ruling that excluded testimony of subsequent repairs. We reverse the directed verdict for Otis Elevator Company and we hold that the district court improperly excluded the expert's testimony on defective design.
On an appeal from a directed verdict for the defendant, we must examine the record in a light most favorable to the plaintiff and "determine whether, as a matter of law, the record is critically deficient of that minimum quantum of evidence from which a jury might reasonably afford relief." Denneny v. Siegel, 407 F.2d 433, 439 (3d Cir. 1969). Because a directed verdict motion deprives a party of jury fact-determination, we have recognized that "it should be granted sparingly and circumspectly." Patzig v. O'Neil, 577 F.2d 841, 846 (3d Cir. 1978).
The district court gave the following reason for directing verdict for Otis:
". . . (A)s to 402A, the record is absolutely devoid of any competent evidence proving a design defect in the construction of this elevator as originally designed and installed."
The trial judge's conclusion that the record was devoid of competent evidence to establish a design defect depends on whether his ruling precluding certain expert testimony was correct. Thus we must first examine the rulings precluding certain portions of the proffered expert testimony.
Knight assigns as error the district court's refusal to permit Emerson Venable to testify as an expert on whether unguarded elevator control buttons constituted a design defect. Absent an abuse of discretion, we will not interfere with the district court's decision on an expert's competence to testify. Universal Athletic Sales Co. v. American Gym, Recreational & Athletic Equipment Corp., 546 F.2d 530, 537 (3d Cir. 1976), Cert. denied, 430 U.S. 984, 97 S.Ct. 1681, 52 L.Ed.2d 378 (1977). We must nevertheless assess the district court's ruling in light of the liberal policy of permitting expert testimony which will "probably aid" the trier of fact. Id.
When making his ruling to preclude certain aspects of proffered testimony by Venable, the trial judge commented as follows:
Direct and extended cross-examination regarding the witness' qualifications establish a background in engineering with special reference to chemistry and safety, including machine guarding, toxicology and industrial hygiene.
He has designed machine guards on occasions which he cannot detail, and in at least one instance had designed guard buttons in connection with the operation of a punch press.
While he contends he has been consulted on certain elevator claims, he has been unable to relate any precise details as to the nature of the claims, their time frame, or his personal participation therein.
On the contrary, he has never examined the elevator here in question, has examined no plans or sketches thereof, has not operated or otherwise had any contact with a freight elevator for more than twenty-six years.
He has never designed an elevator or any part thereof, although something of his creation may have been used in the insulation, electrical equipment, relays, or coils of elevators without his knowledge.
His activities as a consulting engineer have primarily and principally involved safety as related to fires, explosions, chemical poisoning, failure of materials, and failure of structural and hydraulic parts.
He is not a design engineer, has had no background or experience in that area, has no specific background or experience with respect to elevators, and no knowledge of this specific elevator.
Accordingly, because of his qualifications in the field of safety and machine guards, and his actual design of certain of such guards, he may testify as to the effect of unguarded elevator control buttons as related to safety, but Because of his lack of expertise as to elevators and elevator design, may not express an opinion as to whether such condition constitutes or constituted a design defect in the construction and installation of said elevator.
Likewise, because of his lack of familiarity with elevators generally, and this elevator in particular, he may not testify as to the operating sequence of the inner gate and outer doors, the boot on the inner gate, inadequate inspections, and violation of statutory and departmental regulations.
Therefore, as to the five-part offer heretofore detailed, as to all of which the defendants object, it is the ruling of the Court, that, one, as to Item (1), unguarded control buttons, the objection is sustained in part and denied in part.
As to Item (2), operating sequence of inner gate and outer doors, Item (3), defective boot, Item (4), inadequate inspections, Item (5), violation of statutory and departmental regulations, the objection is sustained.
Appellant's Appendix at 611a-614a. (emphasis added).
We recognize that the experienced trial judge was confronted with a shotgun approach in that plaintiff's counsel peppered the court with several contentions as to areas in which Venable's testimony was admissible. The trial judge tried valiantly to sort out these issues, and we conclude his rulings were correct as to all aspects except one. That one error, however, requires a reversal. When he ruled that Venable could not express an opinion on whether "unguarded elevator control buttons . . . constituted a design defect in the construction and installation of said elevator" Id. at 613a, the trial judge invaded the arena reserved exclusively for the fact finder and thus he erred. While the ultimate fact finders the jury could decide that Venable's testimony was not credible and therefore attach no weight to it, this aspect of credibility was nevertheless within the exclusive province of the jury.
From Venable's testimony it appears that he was a consulting chemist and engineer specializing in materials engineering and safety. Since 1947, he has been a registered engineer in Pennsylvania, having studied physics at Carnegie Institute of Technology and safety engineering at the University of Pittsburgh. He later taught a course at the University of Pittsburgh's engineering school, one of the topics of which was "machine guarding." We note further his testimony that his interests were in the guarding and safety elements of machinery, that he had designed safety equipment from 1933 to 1951 and that he had been retained by manufacturers of machinery and had been involved in many investigations of problems on guarding machines. He has designed button guards to prevent inadvertent activation of machinery.
The district court refused to allow Venable to testify as an expert on whether unguarded elevator control buttons were a design defect because it believed that such testimony would require some background in the design and manufacture of elevators. We disagree.
Candidly, we are concerned with an increasing number of trial court rulings which seem to require...
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