Lewis v. Timco, Inc.

• Decision Date: 27 September 1983
• Docket Number: No. 81-3022,81-3022
• Citation: 1984 A.M.C. 191,716 F.2d 1425
• Parties: , 1984 A.M.C. 191 Alfred LEWIS, Plaintiff-Appellant Cross-Appellee, v. TIMCO, INC., et al., Defendants-Appellees, v. JOY MANUFACTURING, Defendant-Appellee Cross-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 1425

716 F.2d 1425

74 A.L.R.Fed. 293, 1984 A.M.C. 191

Alfred LEWIS, Plaintiff-Appellant Cross-Appellee, v. TIMCO, INC., et al., Defendants-Appellees, v. JOY MANUFACTURING, Defendant-Appellee Cross-Appellant.

No. 81-3022.

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit.

Sept. 27, 1983.

Robert K. Guillory, Cornelius Dupre, II, Eunice, La., for Lewis.

Hal Broussard, Lafayette, La., for Timco, Inc.

Patrick A. Juneau, Jr., Lafayette, La., for Home Petroleum.

Robert M. Contois, Jr., Edith Brown Clement, New Orleans, La., for Atwood Oceanic, Inc.

James E. Diaz, Lafayette, La., for Rebel Rentals.

John A. Jeansonne, Jr., Lafayette, La., for Joy Mfg.

Vinson & Elkins, Charles T. Newton, Jr., Harold K. Watson, Houston, Tex., for Petroleum Equip. Suppliers Assoc., amicus curiae.

Appeals from the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.

Before CLARK, Chief Judge, BROWN, GEE, RUBIN, GARZA, REAVLEY, POLITZ, RANDALL, TATE, JOHNSON, WILLIAMS, GARWOOD, JOLLY and HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judges.

PATRICK E. HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judge:

We face the question of whether the doctrine of comparative fault applies in a products liability suit maintained under the maritime jurisdiction of the federal courts. We are persuaded that it does.

I

Alfred Lewis was injured when working as a member of a crew furnished by his employer, Timco, Inc., to Atwood Oceanics, Inc. for work aboard Oceanics' drilling barge, the Vicksburg. At the time of the accident, the Vicksburg was in Louisiana's territorial waters.

Lewis operated hydraulic tongs used to "make up" tubing joints to be placed in a well. These tongs were owned and supplied by Rebel Rentals, Inc. and were manufactured by Joy Manufacturing, Inc. On the day before the accident, equipment was accidentally dropped in the drilling hole. Edwards Rental and Fishing Tools, Inc. furnished an employee to retrieve the equipment from the hole with a special fishing tool. Lewis was using the hydraulic tongs to assist in the "make up" of the fishing tool. Because of a design defect, these tongs failed to shut off when Lewis released their throttle and a snubbing cable attached to the tongs wrapped around Lewis, seriously injuring him.

A trial to the court resulted in an award for Lewis's serious and permanently disabling injuries. The trial court found multiple causes for the injury. It found that Lewis was negligent in attempting to make up the fishing tool joint without adjusting the length of the snubbing line. It found that the tongs manufactured by Joy Manufacturing had a design defect that allowed them to continue operating when the throttle was released. It also found that Rebel's representatives were negligent in failing to instruct Lewis as to the proper method of synchronizing the tong controls. Finally, it found that the Edwards employee had been negligent in not advising Lewis to shorten the snub line. The trial court apportioned 20 percent of the fault each to Joy Manufacturing and Rebel Rentals, 10 percent to Edwards Rental, and 50 percent to Lewis.

On appeal a panel of this court affirmed all but the district court's reduction of Lewis's award against Joy Manufacturing by the amount of his fault. 697 F.2d 1252 (5th Cir.1983). We granted a petition to rehear en banc the manufacturer's entitlement to the reduction. Lewis argues that Joy Manufacturing's liability for the product defect should not be reduced by that part of his injury caused by his own negligence. He argues alternatively that if comparative fault be applied the trial court's assessment of 50 percent was clearly erroneous. The panel having concluded that comparative fault was not to be applied did not reach the question of whether there was sufficient evidence to sustain that level of fault. We find that issue appropriate for decision by the panel and return the case to it for that review. We decide only that the trial court was correct in its decision that the maritime principle of comparative fault is applicable in maritime cases that urge strict liability for defects in products.

We will review comparative fault as applied under the maritime law, then turn to its application in products cases where liability rests on the principle of strict liability. ¹ Finally, we will explain the basic policy choice we make. We turn first to comparative fault in maritime jurisprudence, pausing to explain our jurisdiction and the relevance of state law.

II

The citizenship of the parties was not diverse and Lewis's suit by the time of trial was footed solely upon maritime jurisdiction. There is such jurisdiction because the injury was sustained on board a drilling barge, a "vessel," in the navigable territorial waters of Louisiana. In maritime tort cases courts traditionally apply principles of maritime law, as informed by common law tort developments, Sea-Land Services, Inc. v. Gaudet, 414 U.S. 573, 94 S.Ct. 806, 39 L.Ed.2d 9 (1974), unless a policy determination has been made by the Congress. Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U.S. 618, 98 S.Ct. 2010, 56 L.Ed.2d 581 (1978). Admiralty courts make their own decisions but, true to legal analogical processes, do so with an awareness of other courts' solutions to similar problems, sensitive to whether a "significant policy" of the state within whose territorial waters the injury occurred "would be frustrated by such an application." See Watz v. Zapata Off-Shore Co., 431 F.2d 100, 113 (5th Cir.1970).

III

Admiralty courts have long engaged in the exercise of comparing plaintiffs' negligence to both fault and non-fault based liability of defendants. For example, comparative fault is applied in the strict liability action for unseaworthiness, Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, 346 U.S. 406, 408-09, 74 S.Ct. 202, 204, 98 L.Ed. 143 (1953), in personal injury actions under the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C. Sec. 688, in actions brought under the Death on the High Seas Act, 46 U.S.C. Sec. 766, and in longshoremen's suits against vessels under the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act, 33 U.S.C. Sec. 901 et seq. Gay v. Ocean Transport & Trading, Ltd., 546 F.2d 1233, 1238 (5th Cir.1977). "The admiralty rule in personal injury cases is, in effect, one of comparative negligence." G. Gilmore & C. Black, The Law of Admiralty 500 n. 70 (2d ed. 1975).

Lewis's desire to except maritime products cases from this consistent application of comparative fault also overlooks the fact that maritime law traditionally resists doctrinal change that might balkanize its uniformity and generality. Most notably, courts applying maritime law have repeatedly rejected choice of law notions that would reference state tort doctrines. State workers' compensation schemes were held to be inapplicable to personal injury claims arising from maritime related work on vessels in navigable waters. Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205, 37 S.Ct. 524, 61 L.Ed. 1086 (1917). State negligence law was held not applicable in a maritime personal injury suit, Carlisle Packing Co. v. Sandanger, 259 U.S. 255, 42 S.Ct. 475, 66 L.Ed. 927 (1922), including state law defenses of contributory negligence, Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, 346 U.S. at 409-11, 74 S.Ct. at 204-06. In 1948 Congress extended admiralty jurisdiction shoreward with the Extension of Admiralty Act, 46 U.S.C. Sec. 740, which provides that maritime jurisdiction shall include loss caused by a vessel on navigable water even if the injury is finally suffered on land. Even resort to states' wrongful death statutes ended with recognition of a general maritime law right of recovery for wrongful death. Moragne v. States Marine Lines, 398 U.S. 375, 90 S.Ct. 1772, 26 L.Ed.2d 339 (1970); see Matter of S/S Helena, 529 F.2d 744 (5th Cir.1976).

In sum, comparative fault has long been the accepted risk-allocating principle under the maritime law, a conceptual body whose cardinal mark is uniformity. These values of uniformity, with their companion quality of predictability, a prized value in the extensive underwriting of marine risks, are best preserved by declining to recognize a new and distinct doctrine without assuring the completeness of its fit. We are persuaded that the fit within general maritime principles of a doctrine of strict liability for defective products without comparative fault would be uneven at best.

The Death on the High Seas Act, which encompasses claims for personal injuries caused by defects in products, illustrates the problems of not recognizing comparative fault in maritime products liability cases. Under DOHSA, the court is directed to "take into consideration the degree of negligence attributable to the decedent and reduce the recovery accordingly." 46 U.S.C. Sec. 766. If Lewis's argument were accepted, when a worker's death on the high seas was caused by a defective product, the recovery would be reduced on account of the worker's negligence, but not when he was only injured. Moreover, because DOHSA applies to accidents occurring beyond a marine league from shore plaintiffs would be treated differently depending upon where a fatal accident occurred.

Other examples of its poor fit come quickly to mind in multi-party litigation so common to the admiralty practice. When a negligent plaintiff, negligent defendants, and the manufacturer of a defective product are all held jointly responsible for injuries, plaintiff's negligence would diminish his potential recovery from the negligent defendants but not from the manufacturer. If the liability was joint and several, plaintiff could recover the entire amount of his damages from the manufacturer. From the plaintiff's perspective, assuming the solvency of the manufacturer, it is as if there were no doctrine of comparative fault with respect to the negligent defendants as well. From the manufacturer's perspective, contribution might be available, but somebody would bear more than his share of the damages. In other words, erosion of the comparative fault principle, once...