State Farm Fire & Cas. Co v. Delta Beverage Group Inc
| Decision Date | 16 November 2010 |
| Docket Number | No. 08-31237,08-31237 |
| Parties | STATE FARM FIRE & CASUALTY CO; LJMB, INC., doing business as Brian's Superette; BRIAN WEDERSTRANDT; AMANDA WEDERSTRANDT; LJMB, INC., doing business as Talk of the Town Beauty Salon, Plaintiffs-Appellants v. DELTA BEVERAGE GROUP INC., Defendants-Appellee |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Louisiana
USDC No. 3:07
Before STEWART, DENNIS, and HAYNES, Circuit Judges.
*
This is a tort suit arising under Louisiana law, in which this court's jurisdiction is based on diversity of citizenship. The question is whether a beverage distribution company, Delta Beverage Group, Inc. (Delta), can be held liable for a fire at a convenience store that appears to have started in one of the company's beverage coolers. The district court granted summaryjudgment in Delta's favor. We affirm because even when the evidence is viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs, it does not exclude with a fair amount of certainty several reasonable hypotheses, under which the negligent actions of someone other than a Delta employee was the cause of the fire.
This case started with a fire that broke out on February 16, 2006, at Brian's Superette, a small grocery store and gas station in Maurepas, Louisiana. The plaintiffs are as follows: LJMB, Inc., which is the owner of Brian's Superette as well as a neighboring business, Talk of the Town Beauty Salon (Talk of the Town); Brian and Amanda Wederstrandt, who are the owners of LJMB and the operators of the two businesses; and State Farm Fire & Casualty Co. (State Farm), which was LJMB's insurer at the time of the fire. LJMB seeks damages for losses not reimbursed by State Farm, and State Farm seeks to recover as the subrogated insurer of LJMB and on behalf of its insureds. The plaintiffs sued three defendants: Delta, which is the local distributor of Pepsi products; Coca-Cola Enterprises, Inc. (Coca-Cola); and True Manufacturing Company (True), which manufactured the beverage coolers. Both Delta and Coca-Cola had installed beverage coolers manufactured by True in Brian's Superette. The plaintiffs settled with True during mediation. More recently, after the district court granted summary judgment in favor of Delta and Coca-Cola and while this suit was on appeal, the plaintiffs settled with Coca-Cola. Thus, Delta is now the only remaining defendant.
Brian Wederstrandt had contracts with both Coca-Cola and Delta under which the two companies installed beverage coolers in the store. The parties agree that the fire began in a Pepsi cooler positioned along a wall of the store, by the checkout counter. During the years between the store'sopening in 2003 and the fire in 2006, the coolers were arranged and rearranged in different positions next to one another along that wall. Some time in 2004, Delta employees moved two Coca-Cola coolers from their positions along the wall in order to make room for two Pepsi coolers. There were then two Pepsi coolers and one Coca-Cola cooler along the wall. In January 2005, there was a maintenance issue with one of the Pepsi coolers along the wall, which was repaired by Delta. In July 2005, Coca-Cola installed a small cooler next to the three larger coolers.
When the fire broke out on February 16, 2006, it did substantial damage to both Brian's Superette and Talk of the Town. The parties agree, based on expert testimony, that the fire originated in one of the two Pepsi coolers arranged along the wall by the checkout counter, most likely due to an electrical malfunction. They also agree that the electrical malfunction occurred due to the cooler's being plugged into an extension cord, in violation of both the cooler's installation manual and the National Electrical Code.1 There is no direct evidence concerning who plugged the cooler into the extension cord. Conceivably, it could have been (1) Wederstrandt; (2) one of Wederstrandt's employees at the store; (3) one of Delta's employees when they installed or repaired the Pepsi coolers; or (4) one of Coca-Cola's employees when they installed or repaired the Coke coolers.
The parties consented to have their case decided by a magistrate judge, who rendered summary judgment for the defendants. The plaintiffs appealed, and subsequently settled with Coca-Cola, leaving Delta as the remaining defendant-appellee.
"This court applies a de novo standard of review when determining whether a district court erred in granting summary judgment." LaBarge Pipe & Steel Co. v. First Bank, 550 F.3d 442, 449 (5th Cir. 2008). Summary judgment is proper when the evidence shows that "there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). A genuine issue of material fact exists "if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict in favor of the nonmoving party." Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). "[W]e are obliged to construe all the evidence and reasonable inferences deduced therefrom in a light most favorable to... the nonmoving party in the court below." Xtreme Lashes, LLC v. Xtended Beauty, Inc., 576 F.3d 221, 226 (5th Cir. 2009) (alteration in original) (quoting Int'l Shortstop, Inc. v. Rally's, Inc., 939 F.2d 1257, 1260 (5th Cir. 1991).
To recover for negligence under Louisiana law, "the plaintiff must prove that the conduct in question was a cause-in-fact of the resulting harm, the defendant owed a duty of care to the plaintiff, the requisite duty was breached by the defendant, and the risk of the harm was within the scope of the protection afforded by the duty breached." McCloud v. Hous. Auth. of New Orleans, 987 So. 2d 360, 362-63 (La. Ct. App. 2008).
Rando v. Anco Insulations, Inc., 16 So. 3d 1065, 1090 (La. 2009) (internal citations omitted); see also Hanks v. Entergy Corp., 944 So. 2d 564, 579 (La. 2006); Benjamin ex rel. Benjamin v. Hous. Auth. of New Orleans, 893 So. 2d 1, 4-5 (La. 2004); Stroik v. Ponseti, 699 So. 2d 1072, 1079 (La. 1997); Lacey v. La. Coca-Cola Bottling Co., 452 So. 2d 162, 164 (La. 1984).
In this case, the plaintiffs' evidence is insufficient to survive summary judgment because no reasonable jury could conclude that it was more likely than not that a Delta employee's actions caused the fire. The evidence does not exclude with a fair amount of certainty several other reasonable possibilities: that a Coca-Cola employee, Wederstrandt, or one of Wederstrandt's employees plugged the Pepsi cooler into an extension cord.
First, the plaintiffs do not exclude with a fair amount of certainty the reasonable possibility that Wederstrandt or one of his employees plugged the Pepsi cooler into an extension cord. This could have happened at any point during the two years between 2004, when the Pepsi cooler that caught fire was installed, and 2006, when the fire occurred. The plaintiffs' own experts testified that they saw extension cords being used in several placesthroughout Brian's Superette, and Wederstrandt admitted in his deposition that at one point he plugged a cappuccino machine into an extension cord.
Wederstrandt asserts in an affidavit, without corroborating evidence, that neither he nor his employees plugged the Pepsi cooler into an extension cord. However, for the purposes of summary judgment, these assertions are insufficient to constitute evidence that would exclude with a fair amount of certainty the reasonable possibility that he or someone other than a Delta employee may have plugged the Pepsi cooler into an extension cord. See DIRECTV, Inc. v. Budden, 420 F.3d 521, 531 (5th Cir. 2005) (...
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