Miller v. Todd
| Decision Date | 27 March 1990 |
| Docket Number | No. 49S02-9003-CV-226,49S02-9003-CV-226 |
| Citation | 551 N.E.2d 1139 |
| Parties | Prod.Liab.Rep. (CCH) P 12,433 Carolyn S. MILLER, Appellant (Plaintiff Below), v. William H. TODD, U.S. Suzuki Motor Corp. and Suzuki Motor Co., Ltd., Appellees (Defendant Below). |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
The question is whether a manufacturer may be liable for the enhancement of injuries sustained while using a product even though the cause of the accident was not the product itself. We hold that an action can lie for such damages.
Carolyn Miller was injured in a motorcycle accident in August 1982. She was a passenger on a Suzuki motorcycle owned and operated by William Todd. The motorcycle skidded on gravel and went out of control. Miller's right leg was crushed between the motorcycle and the ground; Todd's leg was protected by the crash bars he had installed on the front of his motorcycle.
Miller's amended complaint for damages against U.S. Suzuki Motor Corporation and Suzuki Motor Company, Ltd. ("Suzuki") claimed that the motorcycle was defective and unreasonably dangerous because it did not have rear passenger crash bars. Miller sought recovery under theories of negligence and strict liability.
The defect about which Miller complained did not cause the accident, but it allegedly enhanced the injuries she received as a result of the accident. 1 She proposed liability for such injuries under the doctrine of crashworthiness. 2 Under the doctrine of crashworthiness a motor vehicle manufacturer may be liable in negligence or strict liability for injuries sustained in a motor vehicle accident where a manufacturing or design defect, though not the cause of the accident, caused or enhanced the injuries. Camacho v. Honda Motor Co., 741 P.2d 1240, 1242-43 (Colo.1987) cert. dismissed, 485 U.S. 901, 108 S.Ct. 1067, 99 L.Ed.2d 229 (1988); see also Nicolodi v. Harley-Davidson Motor Co. 370 So.2d 68, 70 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App.1979).
Suzuki moved for summary judgment, arguing that the dangers of riding a motorcycle without crash bars are open and obvious. The trial court granted Suzuki's motion, finding that there were no genuine issues of material fact and the defendants were entitled to judgment as a matter of law.
The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's grant of summary judgment based on the understanding that the plaintiff must prove a latent defect before the court will consider the manufacturer's duty to design and produce a crashworthy vehicle. Miller v. Todd (1988), Ind.App., 518 N.E.2d 1124. The Court of Appeals concluded that the absence of crash bars is such an obvious danger that as a matter of law all motorcycle users should know the danger involved in riding a motorcycle that does not have crash bars. Id. (citing Bemis Co., Inc. v. Rubush (1981), Ind., 427 N.E.2d 1058).
The sole issue in Miller's petition to transfer is whether the open and obvious danger rule applies to relieve the manufacturer of a motorcycle of the duty to design and make a crashworthy vehicle by installing rear passenger crash bars. Suzuki attempts to define the issues as whether the dangers involved in riding a motorcycle without rear passenger crash bars are open and obvious to a passenger on a motorcycle and whether the crashworthiness doctrine applies to defeat the affirmative defense of open and obvious danger.
Both parties argue their positions concerning the open and obvious doctrine as applied to a claim of enhanced injuries. We grant transfer to determine whether an injured party can recover for enhanced injuries under either negligence or strict liability.
The plaintiff in a crashworthiness case has the burden of proving that the manufacturer breached its duty in a manner that proximately caused the plaintiff's injuries. The first case to hold that a manufacturer has a duty use reasonable care to design a vehicle to avoid subjecting the user to an unreasonable risk of injury in the event of a collision did so in recognition of the manufacturer's ability to foresee the statistical inevitability of collisions. Larsen v. General Motors Corp., 391 F.2d 495, 502 (8th Cir.1968) (). Accepting this inevitability, the Eighth Circuit declared that the intended use of an automobile includes surviving collisions. Id. at 501-02. This doctrine has been accepted in the majority of jurisdictions. Jackson v. Warrum (1989), Ind.App., 535 N.E.2d 1207, 1215.
The Larsen court discussed the policy behind its conclusion, stating:
The manufacturer's duty to use reasonable care in the design and manufacture of a product to minimize injuries to its users and not to subject its users to an unreasonable risk of injury in the event of a collision or impact should be recognized by the courts.... Legal acceptance or imposition of this duty would go far in protecting the user from unreasonable risks. The normal risk of driving must be accepted by the user but there is no need to further penalize the user by subjecting him to unreasonable risk of injury due to negligence in design.
The Larsen court did not require a manufacturer to construct an accident-proof vehicle; rather, it held that general negligence principles apply to impose liability when unreasonable risk of injury is created by the manufacturer's design. 391 F.2d at 502. Larsen suggests that whether or not the design creates unreasonable danger can be determined using general negligence principles "which involve a balancing of the likelihood of harm, and the gravity of harm if it happens against the burden of the precautions which would be effective to avoid the harm." 391 F.2d at 502, n. 3 (citing Noel, Manufacturer's Negligence of Design or Directions for Use of a Product, 71 Yale L.J. 816, 818 (1962)).
The Larsen opinion also offers guidance in determining liability in this type of case:
Any design defect not causing the accident would not subject the manufacturer to liability for the entire damage, but the manufacturer should be liable for that portion of the damage or injury caused by the defective design over and above the damage or injury that probably would have occurred as a result of the impact or collision absent the defective design.
In 1977 the Seventh Circuit concluded that Indiana law would recognize that one who is injured as a result of a mechanical defect in a motor vehicle should be protected under the doctrine of strict liability even though the defect was not the cause of the collision which precipitated the injury. Huff v. White Motor Corp., 565 F.2d 104 (7th Cir.1977). Because this Court had not addressed the issue of whether a manufacturer can be held liable for enhanced injuries, the Seventh Circuit took guidance from our adoption of Sec. 402A of the Restatement (Second) of Torts, and from their survey of the law of other jurisdictions which indicated that the majority of states had adopted the rule put forth in Larsen. Huff, 565 F.2d at 106-07.
The viability of an enhanced injury claim was addressed more recently in Masterman v. Veldman's Equipment, Inc. (1988), Ind.App., 530 N.E.2d 312. The First District Court of Appeals determined in Masterman that common law and statutes referring to liability "for harm caused" do not require the defective condition of the product to be the cause of the accident which produced the injuries. Accordingly, the court concluded the Mastermans could pursue a claim under Ind.Code Sec. 33-1-1.5-3 for injuries caused by a product even though the product did not cause the collision. 530 N.E.2d at 315.
This duty to design a crashworthy vehicle has been extended to motorcycle manufacturers. Nicolodi v. Harley-Davidson Motor Co., 370 So.2d 68. The court in Nicolodi advanced two significant reasons for doing so. First, it is just as foreseeable that a motorcycle will be involved in an accident as it is foreseeable that an automobile will be involved in an accident. Second, for transportation purposes, a motorcycle is as much a motor vehicle as an automobile and the scope of reasonably foreseeable use is the same. Id. at 71. Contra Hunt v. Harley-Davidson Motor Co., 147 Ga.App. 44, 248 S.E.2d 15 (1978) ().
We now recognize the theory of crashworthiness presented in Larsen as the basis for a viable cause of action. In effect, the doctrine of crashworthiness merely expands the proximate cause requirement to include enhanced injuries. Because it is foreseeable that a motorcycle will be involved in collisions, for purposes of products liability law an accident is included in the concept of expected use of a motorcycle as well.
We next turn to the question of the propriety of the trial court's summary judgment on Miller's claims based on strict liability and negligence. On appeal, we review a grant of summary judgment under the same standard used by a trial court. Summary judgment may be granted only where there is no genuine issue of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Even if there is no core factual issue in dispute, summary judgment is nevertheless inappropriate if one may draw conflicting inferences from the undisputed facts. The moving party must show the absence of any genuine issue of material fact, and all doubts and inferences are resolved against the moving party. Rozek v. American Family Mutual Ins. Co. (1987), Ind.App., 512 N.E.2d 232, 234.
The Indiana open and obvious danger rule does not apply to strict liability claims under the Indiana Product Liability Act. Koske v. Townsend Engineering Co. (1990)...
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