Santos v. Chrysler Corporation

• Decision Date: 25 August 1999
• Citation: 715 NE2d 47,430 Mass. 198
• Parties: PAUL J. SANTOS, JR., individually and as executor, & another v. CHRYSLER CORPORATION & another.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

430 Mass. 198

715 NE2d 47

PAUL J. SANTOS, JR., individually and as executor,¹ & another² v. CHRYSLER CORPORATION & another.³

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

May 6, 1999.

August 25, 1999.

Present: WILKINS, C.J., ABRAMS, LYNCH, GREANEY, MARSHALL, & IRELAND, JJ.

Andrew J. McElaney, Jr. (Peter M. Durney with him) for Chrysler Corporation.

Cynthia J. Cohen (Leo V. Boyle & Samuel M. Furgang with her) for the plaintiff. John J. Ryan, Jr. (Emily G. Coughlin with him) for Post Motors, Inc.

ABRAMS, J.

The wife and three children of the plaintiff, Paul J. Santos, Jr., were killed in an automobile accident. He sued the defendant Chrysler Corporation (Chrysler), the manufacturer of his 1986 Plymouth Voyager minivan, for negligence, breach of warranty of merchantability, and wrongful death. The plaintiff also sued Post Motors, Inc. (Post Motors), the retail seller, for negligence. Post Motors cross-claimed for indemnification from Chrysler. A jury returned special verdicts against Chrysler. The jury determined that Post Motors was not negligent. But see note 30, infra. The judge concluded that Post Motors was entitled to indemnity from Chrysler. Chrysler appeals, alleging error in the denial of its motions for a directed verdict, mistrial, judgment notwithstanding the verdict, and a new trial.

Chrysler challenges several of the judge's evidentiary rulings. It also argues that the judge erred by permitting improper closing argument, by failing to eliminate the plaintiff's wrongful death recoveries, and by entering the judgment retroactively. In addition, Chrysler appeals from the judgment for Post Motors on its cross claim for indemnity. We allowed Chrysler's application for direct appellate review. We affirm the judgments against Chrysler in favor of the plaintiff. We remand the judgment against Chrysler in favor of Post Motors for the calculation of interest in accordance with Sterilite Corp. v. Continental Cas. Co., 397 Mass. 837 (1986).

1. The trial. In February, 1990, the plaintiff was driving his 1986 Plymouth Voyager minivan in New Hampshire. The plaintiff, his wife, and their three children were returning to Belmont from a ski trip in Canada. The plaintiff applied the brakes after approaching traffic which was slowed behind a snow plow. The rear of the minivan slid to the right and the vehicle swerved into the oncoming lane, where it was hit broadside by a Ford Bronco. The plaintiff's wife and three children died as a result of the accident. The plaintiff sustained personal injuries.

The plaintiff offered expert testimony to establish that the cause of the accident was premature rear wheel lockup. Rear wheel lockup occurs when a driver applies the brakes, the rear wheels lock before the front, causing the rear of the vehicle to skid.⁴ The plaintiff claimed that the rear wheel lockup was premature, meaning that it happened in circumstances in which an ordinary driver reasonably would not anticipate. The plaintiff alleged that premature rear wheel lockup was a design defect, which, in turn, was caused by one or more design defects that existed or could have occurred in the minivan's brake system.⁵ Chrysler contended that the accident was caused by driver error in hazardous winter weather.

A jury found that Chrysler was negligent, grossly negligent, and had violated the implied warranty of merchantability. The jury determined that Post Motors was not negligent. The jury also found the plaintiff to be ten per cent negligent. The jury awarded $12.8 million in compensatory damages for the wrongful deaths of the wife and children, the conscious pain and suffering of the wife, the wife's lost future earnings, and the plaintiff's personal injuries. The jury also awarded $15,705 in punitive damages.⁶

In March, 1996, Chrysler filed motions for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, for a new trial, and to correct the judgment. The judge allowed in part the motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict as to the award of lost future earnings of the wife. The other motions were denied. In June, 1997, the judge allowed the plaintiff's motion for entry of separate and final judgment, retroactively entering judgment to September, 1996. In January, 1998, the judge entered a separate judgment for Post Motors on the indemnity claim.

2. Evidentiary rulings. a. Other incident evidence. Chrysler argues that the judge erred by admitting, over its objection, the testimony of six Chrysler minivan owners regarding other incidents involving their own minivans as well as National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) vehicle owners' questionnaires (VOQs) submitted by the six owners. The evidence was admitted for three purposes: to establish notice; to corroborate the alleged defect; and to refute evidence that the minivan was designed without safety hazards.⁷

Evidence of incidents similar to the plaintiff's is viewed with disfavor because the other incidents "may have been the consequence of idiosyncratic circumstances." Read v. Mt. Tom Ski Area, Inc., 37 Mass. App. Ct. 901, 902 (1994). However, such evidence is admissible if the judge first determines that the jury could find a substantial similarity in circumstances.⁸ See Kromhout v. Commonwealth, 398 Mass. 687, 693 (1986). See also Simmons v. Monarch Mach. Tool Co., 413 Mass. 205, 214 (1992); Griffin v. General Motors Corp., 380 Mass. 362, 365-366 (1980); Robitaille v. Netoco Community Theatre of N. Attleboro, Inc., 305 Mass. 265, 268 (1940). The judge also must determine that there is minimal danger of unfairness, confusion, and undue expenditure of time in the trial of collateral issues. See Kromhout, supra; Robitaille, supra.

The admission of other incident evidence rests within the judge's discretion. See id.

Chrysler points to several differences between the other incidents and the plaintiff's accident, arguing that the judge erred in concluding that the jury could find the incidents were sufficiently similar to the plaintiff's accident. Five of the six witnesses owned minivans of a different model year than the plaintiff's minivan. Four of the six minivans had a shielded height sensing proportioning valve (HSPV), while the plaintiff's was unshielded.⁹ None of the other incidents occurred on snow or ice.

We conclude that, although they did not replicate the exact circumstances of the plaintiff's accident, the other incidents could be found by the jury to be substantially similar. Each of the witnesses described the rear ends of their minivans skidding or swerving following hard application of the brakes. Although not all the witnesses specifically stated that their wheels "locked up," the jury could infer the phenomenon from the words used by the witnesses.¹⁰ There was evidence that the braking system was essentially the same in all the minivans, regardless of whether the HSPVs were shielded or not. In addition, the plaintiff offered numerous additional reasons for premature rear wheel lockup, see note 5, supra, aside from contamination of the unshielded HSPV. All the witnesses testified to incidents on wet roads. Although there was evidence that the plaintiff's accident occurred in snowy conditions, there was evidence that most of the snow had been cleared and the road was only wet. The differences between the other incidents and the plaintiff's accident could be considered by the jury in terms of weight of the evidence.¹¹ Wheeler v. John Deere Co., 862 F.2d 1404, 1408 (10th Cir. 1988). Chrysler next argues that substantial similarity between the other incidents and the plaintiff's accident could not be established without expert testimony regarding the existence of the same defect, premature rear wheel lockup, in the witnesses' minivans and the causative relationship between the defect and the incidents. In Chrysler's view, the witnesses, because they were ordinary drivers, were not capable of identifying premature wheel rear lockup. Chrysler relies on United States v. General Motors Corp., 841 F.2d 400 (D.C. Cir. 1988), in which the court said that "consumers were not capable of discerning whether what they experienced was an incidence of premature rear-wheel lock-up." Id. at 412.

The General Motors case is inapposite. There, the government brought an action under the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act, alleging that General Motors vehicles had defective braking systems that caused premature rear wheel lockup. Id. at 401. The government "relied heavily" on other incident evidence, in the form of consumer complaints, to meet its burden of proving a defect. Id. at 406. The court held that the consumer complaints were insufficient to establish the existence of a defect. Id. at 411-412.

Here, the plaintiff did not rely on the other incident evidence to prove the existence of a defect in Chrysler minivans. Evidence of a defect was introduced in the form of expert testimony. The other incident testimony was put in evidence to establish notice, to corroborate the alleged defect, and to refute evidence that the minivan was designed without safety hazards. The judge instructed the jurors that they could consider the evidence only for these purposes during the testimony and again in the charge.¹² Thus, unlike the government in General Motors, the plaintiff did not rely on the other incident evidence to prove the defect. The jury could assess the similarity of the other incidents to the plaintiff's accident based on the explanation of premature rear wheel lockup presented to them by the plaintiff's expert. Further expert testimony identifying the defects in the witnesses' minivans and the causes of their incidents was not required.¹³

b. Chrysler's expert statistician. Chrysler argues that the judge erred by excluding the testimony of its expert. The expert analyzed the data contained in the NHTSA's fatal accident reporting system (FARS), which records various data about fatal accidents. The expert would have testified...