Metro. Prop. v. Deere

• Decision Date: 16 August 2011
• Docket Number: No. 18341.,18341.
• Citation: 302 Conn. 123,25 A.3d 571
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: METROPOLITAN PROPERTY AND CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANYv.DEERE AND COMPANY et al.

302 Conn. 123

25 A.3d 571

METROPOLITAN PROPERTY AND CASUALTY INSURANCE COMPANY

v.DEERE AND COMPANY et al.

No. 18341.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Argued April 19, 2011.Decided Aug. 16, 2011.

Bruce H. Raymond, with whom were Lanell H. Allen and, on the brief, N. Kane Bennett, Sharon S. Koziol and Joseph J. Blyskal, Glastonbury, for the appellant (named defendant).Heather J. Adams–Beman, with whom were Todd S. Federico and, on the brief, Susan L. Miller, West Hartford, for the appellee (plaintiff).ROGERS, C.J., and NORCOTT, PALMER, ZARELLA, McLACHLAN, EVELEIGH and HARPER, Js.ZARELLA, J.

This appeal ¹ arises from a product liability action brought by the plaintiff, Metropolitan Property and Casualty Insurance Company, against the named defendant, Deere and Company,² in which the plaintiff claimed that a lawn tractor manufactured by the defendant contained a manufacturing defect in its electrical system that caused a fire resulting in the destruction of the home of the plaintiff's insureds. The defendant appeals from the judgment of the trial court rendered in favor of the plaintiff, following a jury verdict for the plaintiff. On appeal, the defendant claims that the trial court improperly (1) admitted certain evidence regarding the drivability of the tractor, (2) declined to exclude the testimony of two of the plaintiff's experts pursuant to State v. Porter, 241 Conn. 57, 698 A.2d 739 (1997), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 1058, 118 S.Ct. 1384, 140 L.Ed.2d 645 (1998), and on the basis of spoliation of evidence, and (3) denied the defendant's motions for a directed verdict and to set aside the verdict, in which the defendant claimed that the plaintiff had failed to present sufficient evidence to establish liability. The plaintiff responds that the trial court properly admitted the evidence and expert testimony at issue and that it presented sufficient evidence to sustain the jury's verdict pursuant to the “malfunction theory” of products liability, which permits a plaintiff to prove its case on the basis of circumstantial evidence. Although we agree that a plaintiff may base a product liability action on the “malfunction theory,” we conclude that the plaintiff's evidence in the present case was insufficient to establish its products liability claim, and, therefore, we reverse the judgment of the trial court.

The jury reasonably could have found the following facts. On July 13, 2003, at approximately 1 p.m., a fire occurred at the home of Spyro Kallivrousis and Roula Kallivrousis (homeowners) in the town of Cheshire. On the day of the fire, Spyro Kallivrousis was at work while his wife, Roula Kallivrousis, was at home with their two children, tending to the yard. Roula Kallivrousis attempted to mow the lawn with their John Deere LX 178 lawn tractor (tractor) at approximately 10 a.m. that same day, but the tractor's engine was running roughly and she was unable to finish. The homeowners purchased the tractor in April, 1998, and had not had any problems with the tractor until the spring of 2003. Roula Kallivrousis, who was the primary user of the tractor, reported that it had been running roughly and backfiring repeatedly for several months prior to the fire after a tune-up and some maintenance performed by both the dealer that sold the tractor and by Spyro Kallivrousis. Because the rough running was particularly severe that morning, Roula Kallivrousis stopped mowing and returned the tractor to its usual storage location in the western-most bay of the attached three bay garage (west bay) and turned it off, at which time the tractor backfired. At about 11:30 a.m., Roula Kallivrousis was going to her car in the garage with her children to drive her son to work when she noticed a “different kind of smell” in the garage, which she likened to the smell of antifreeze. She inspected the interior of the garage, including the tractor, for about five minutes but noticed nothing unusual. Unable to determine the source of the smell, but seeing no cause for alarm, Roula Kallivrousis left the house in her car with her children and closed the garage door behind her. Approximately one and one-half hours later, witnesses reported a fire at the residence, and the Cheshire fire department responded and extinguished the blaze. Although no one was injured, the fire damaged or destroyed a substantial portion of the residence and its contents.

A subsequent investigation by the local and state fire marshals determined that the fire originated in the west bay of the garage. The marshals were able to rule out several potential causes of the fire within the garage, including arson, the home electrical system, and other potential ignition sources, but could not pinpoint the exact cause or the specific location where the fire originated. On the basis of information obtained from their interview with the homeowners and their inspection, the marshals identified the tractor as a likely “significant factor” in the cause of the fire. The marshals did not, however, conduct a full examination of the tractor, leaving that instead to interested parties, such as the plaintiff. Because the marshals did not have sufficient evidence to identify a specific cause of the fire, the marshals officially classified the cause of the fire as undetermined.

The homeowners filed a claim for the loss with the plaintiff, which initiated an investigation into the cause and origin of the fire for the purpose of determining whether it might have a cause of action against a third party. Scott E. Boris, an investigator for New England Fire Cause and Origin, Inc., investigated the fire for the plaintiff. To conduct his investigation, Boris interviewed the homeowners and examined the scene of the fire. During his examination of the scene, Boris utilized a method called delayering, which is the process of systematically examining each piece of debris within the area of suspected origin to determine the specific point of origin of the fire, the ignition source and first fuel burned. During the delayering process, when Boris determined that an item was not related to the cause of the fire, he discarded the item into the backyard of the home. After delayering almost the entire west bay of the garage, Boris concluded that the fire had started in the west bay, with the specific point of origin at the tractor. Because Boris was not an expert in vehicle fires, he did not attempt to delayer or disassemble the tractor to look for an ignition source and, instead, obtained the assistance of Thomas Bush, also an investigator at New England Fire Cause and Origin, Inc., who specialized in vehicle fires. Boris also notified the plaintiff of his conclusion that the fire had started at the tractor, and the plaintiff notified the defendant that its experts intended to examine one of the defendant's products to determine whether it caused the fire.

On July 30, 2003, Bush and the defendant's fire investigator, John D. Walker, met at the home to examine the tractor further. Due to the extensive damage caused by the fire, many of the tractor's components were damaged or destroyed. Based on what remained of the tractor, Bush ruled out all possible causes of fire within the tractor except for the tractor's electrical system, which Bush concluded could not be ruled in, or out, as the cause of the fire. Bush concluded that, of the approximately 30 percent of the electrical system that remained, his examination of the remains revealed no indication of any defects. Bush acknowledged that he would have to speculate as to the exact cause of the fire and that he had no opinion as to whether there was any defect within the tractor attributable to the defendant. Bush also concluded that, although the rough running of the tractor could be indicative of an electrical problem, the drivability problems that Roula Kallivrousis experienced on the morning of the fire were not a direct cause of the fire.

On the same day that he examined the tractor with Bush, Walker also performed his own independent analysis of the scene of the fire to determine the cause and origin. Walker did not, however, have the benefit of seeing the scene in the same condition as Boris because Boris had delayered the garage and left the debris that he had removed unsecured in the backyard for two weeks. On the basis of his investigation of what remained of the scene, Walker concluded that the fire had not originated at the tractor, as Boris concluded, but, instead, had originated in a part of the garage where a workbench had been located, which had sustained the greatest amount of fire damage. Walker agreed with Bush that the rough running of the tractor was not a direct cause of the fire and concluded that none of the remaining electrical components of the tractor showed any signs of a defect. Walker further testified that the tractor's electrical system had fail-safes that would protect against a fire in the event of an electrical failure. On the basis of his investigation, Walker concluded that the tractor was not the cause of the fire and that it was more likely than not that the fire originated at the workbench in the west bay of the garage.

The plaintiff, through its subrogation rights, subsequently brought a product liability action against the defendant, claiming that the tractor's electrical system, which had been manufactured by the defendant, was in a defective condition when it left the defendant's control and that this defect caused the fire. The defendant filed an answer denying that the tractor was defective or that it had caused the fire. The defendant also filed special defenses, including a claim that the plaintiff's expert, Boris, had spoliated the evidence at the fire scene, and a claim of comparative responsibility on the part of the homeowners. See General Statutes § 52–572o (permitting apportionment of damages based on comparative responsibility). Prior to trial, the defendant moved to exclude the...