Case Title: BISHOP v. TAKATA CORP.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 94751

State: oklahoma

Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Date: 2000-09-26T00:00:00Z

Document:
BISHOP v. TAKATA CORP.  BISHOP v. TAKATA CORP. 2000 OK 71 12 P.3d 459 71 OBJ 2388 Case Number: 94751 Decided: 09/26/2000 Supreme Court of Oklahoma MARILYN BISHOP, Personal Representative of the Estate of AMY ELIZABETH BISHOP, deceased, Plaintiff v. TAKATA CORPORATION, a foreign corporation, TAKATA, INC., a Delaware corporation, GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, a Delaware corporation, GENERAL MOTORS OF CANADA LTD., a foreign corporation, CAMI AUTOMOTIVE, INC., a foreign corporation, SUZUKI MOTOR COMPANY LIMITED, a foreign corporation, and SUZUKI MOTOR CORPORATION, a corporation, Defendants CERTIFIED QUESTION OF LAW FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT, WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA Honorable Lee R. West ¶0 The United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma certified the following question pursuant to the Uniform Certification of Questions of Law Act, 20 O.S. Supp. 1997 §1601 et seq. Does 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420 prohibit the admissibility of evidence of the "use or nonuse of a seat belt . . . in any civil suit in Oklahoma" for a manufacturers' products liability claim based on a defective seatbelt restraint system? The question is answered as follows: 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420 prevents a person from being penalized in a civil proceeding for choosing not to wear a seat belt. However, it does not prohibit the introduction of evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts in a manufacturers' liability action for a defective seat belt restraint system. Duke Halley, Woodward, Oklahoma, David K. Petty, Guymon, Oklahoma for Plaintiff. John R. Woodard, III Jody R. Nathan Tulsa, Oklahoma for Defendants Takata Corp. and Takata, Inc. Mary Quinn-Cooper Tulsa, Oklahoma for Defendants General Motors Corp., General Motors of Canada, Ltd., CAMI Automatic, Inc., and Suzuki Motor Corp. Rex Travis Oklahoma City, Oklahoma for Amicus Curiae, Oklahoma Trial Lawyers Association. ¶1 KAUGER, J.: [12 P.3d 460] ¶2 We are asked to answer the question of whether the Oklahoma Mandatory Seat Belt Use Act, FACTS ¶3 On March 4, 1997, Amy Elizabeth Bishop, lost control of her 1991 Geo Metro while driving on a gravel road near Hugoton, Kansas. According to the police report, the car went off of the left side of the road, veered into a ditch, rolled, ejected the driver, and trapped her beneath it. The next day, she died from the injuries sustained in the accident. ¶4 On February 16, 1999, Marilyn Bishop, Amy Bishop's personal representative (personal representatitve) initiated an action in federal district court against the manufacturers and distributors, ¶5 On March 7, 2000, Takata moved for summary judgment, arguing that 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420 ¶6 TITLE 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420 PREVENTS A PERSON FROM BEING PENALIZED IN A CIVIL PROCEEDING FOR CHOOSING NOT TO WEAR A SEAT BELT. HOWEVER, ¶7 Oklahoma adopted the theory of manufacturers' products liability in Kirkland v. General Motors Corp., 1974 OK 52, 521 P.2d 1353 . Kirkland teaches that one who sells a product in a defective condition, which is unreasonably dangerous to the user or consumer, is strictly liable for the physical harm to the person or property caused by the defect. To maintain a cause of action under manufacturers' products liability, the plaintiff must prove the product was the cause of the injury, that the product was defective when it left the control of the manufacturer, and that the defect made the product unreasonably dangerous to an extent beyond which would be contemplated by the ordinary consumer who purchases it. [12 P.3d 462]¶8 The personal representative argues that the Legislature, by enacting 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420,9 did not intend to abrogate products liability actions resulting from defective seat belts. She asserts that automotive manufacturers are charged with the duty, imposed by federal and state law,10See also, regulations 49 C.F.R. §571.208 and §571.209, which were promulgated pursuant to the National Traffic and Motor Safety Act of 1966, 49 U.S.C. §30101 et seq. to make non-defective seat belts and that they should be liable when a seat belt is defective and causes an injury. The amicus curiae insists that the purpose of the statute was to prevent people from being punished for failure to wear a seat belt, not to grant immunity to the manufacturer for the failure to install working seat belts. ¶9 The manufacturers do not dispute that they are required to install non-defective seat belts.11 Nevertheless, they argue that because the personal representative must prove that the seat belt improperly disengaged during the accident and caused the injury the action must fail because 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420,12 by its plain language, prevents her from submitting any evidence relating to the use of seat belts.13Some federal courts have avoided applying state seat belt statutes by determining that the state law is procedural and thus not controlling. See, e.g., Brown v. Ford Motor Co., 67 F. Supp. 2d 581 , 584 (E.D. Virginia 1999). Other courts have allowed products liability actions for defective seat belts without mentioning seat belt exclusion statutes. See, e.g., Hinds v. General Motors Corp., 988 F.2d 1039 (10th Cir. 1993). ¶10 The manufacturers cite our recent decision in Comer v. Preferred Risk Mut. Ins. Co., 1999 OK 86, 991 P.2d 1006 as [12 P.3d 463] dispositive. Although Comer involved the same statutory provision under consideration here, it does not dictate the answer to the certified question. In Comer, we specifically noted that "[t]he question of the statue's application to a products liability action is not before us and we need not address it."14 Comer involved a member of a church youth group who was killed in an automobile accident. The parents sued the church alleging that it was negligent for failing to require their daughter, a back seat passenger of the automobile, to wear a seat belt. The parents argued that the church had a duty to require back seat passengers to use seat belts, and that the statute should be interpreted to preclude the use of a "seat belt defense" of contributory negligence or mitigation of damages, but not to preclude negligence actions altogether. ¶11 In Comer we decided that 47 O.S. 1991 §12-42015 precludes the introduction of evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts to support a claim of negligence in a wrongful death action. We determined that: 1) the Act did not impose a statutory duty upon the operator of a passenger vehicle to require back seat passengers to use a seat belt, nor had this Court ever recognized such a duty at common law; and 2) even if there were such a duty, §12-420 precludes the introduction of evidence of the use or nonuse of a seat belt to support a negligence claim. ¶12 We also recognized in Comer that the Legislature could have mandated the use of seat belts by all passengers, or made particular requirements with regard to minor passengers other than child safety restraint requirements, and that it could have established a basis for a negligence action. Instead, it added 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420,16 prohibiting seat belt evidence in civil actions. Unlike other states with broader statutes, §12-420 is tightly drafted. At issue in Comer was the conduct of the driver and the seat belt user ------ whether the driver had a duty to require a back seat passenger to wear a seat belt and whether a negligence claim would be supported if the back seat passenger failed to do so. At issue in a defective seat belt products liability case is the condition of the seat belt ------ not the conduct of the seat belt user. ¶13 Prior to §12-420's enactment, the Court held in Fields v. Volkswagen of America, Inc., 1976 OK 106, 555 P.2d 48 , 84 A.L.R. 3d 1199, that there was no common law or statutory duty requiring the use of seat belts and that the failure to use a seat belt was not a defense to establish contributory negligence or to reduce the amount of damages to the injured party. The Court essentially invited legislation on the subject of seat belts. It recognized that the seat belt phenomenon was in its infancy, and that the only legislation relating to seat belts at that time was a statute which made it unlawful to sell a post-1966 vehicle without seat belts for the front right and left seats.17 ¶14 The Legislature responded to Fields in 1983, with its enactment of 47 O.S. Supp. 1983 §11-1112,18 regulating the use of child passenger restraint systems and again in 1985, with the enactment of the Oklahoma [12 P.3d 464] Mandatory Seat Belt Use Act.19 The Act sets forth the requirements of seat belt use in passenger cars in Oklahoma, allows for exceptions for certain drivers or passengers,20 and imposes fines and court costs for violations of the Act.21 Considering the Act as a whole, and the context from which it was enacted, the obvious purposes of the Act are to codify public policy of encouraging seat belt use and to make seat belt use mandatory for drivers and front-seat passengers by providing a penalty for nonuse. Section 12-420 expressly clarifies that the sole legal sanction for the failure to wear a seat belt is the fine imposed by the Act and that a person will not be penalized in a civil proceeding, by connotations of fault, for choosing to refrain from wearing a seat belt.22 To read the statute any more broadly would defeat the legislative intent. The entire Act is confined to the regulation of the conduct of the driver or the passenger of a passenger vehicle as seat belt users or nonusers. The Act and §12-420 refer to use and nonuse and absent is any reference to the design or construction of a motor vehicle.23 ¶15 However, since 1965, the Legislature has required manufacturers to offer protection to a vehicle's occupants to prevent or limit injuries by requiring that passenger vehicles be equipped with properly installed safety belts or safety shoulder harnesses.24 The parties rely on decisions from the Supreme Courts of Minnesota and Texas as persuasive authority in support of their arguments. In Olson v. Ford Motor Company, 558 N.W.2d 491 (Minn. 1997) and Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. v. Glyn-Jones, 878 S.W.2d 132, 48 A.L.R. 5th 787 (Tex. 1994), the Minnesota and Texas courts addressed the applicability of their state's seat belt evidence statute to a defective seat belt products liability action with each reaching different conclusions. ¶16 Olson involved a motorist who was allegedly injured by a defective seat belt. The motorist brought a crashworthiness products liability action against the automobile manufacturer. Minnesota's statute prohibited the introduction of "the use or failure to use seat belts . . . in any litigation involving personal injuries or property damage resulting from the use or operation of any motor vehicle."25The Minnesota Court of Appeals in Schlotz v. Hyundai Motor Co., 557 N.W.2d 613 (Minn. App. 1997), cert. denied 522 U.S. 823, 118 S. Ct. 80, 139 L. Ed. 2d 38 (1997) held that Minnesota's statute also barred crashworthiness claims based on the manufacturer's failure to install lap belts and in Anker v. Little, 541 N.W.2d 333 (Minn. App. 1995) ruled that the statute barred a crashworthiness claim based upon the failure to provide automatic seat belts. In 1999, the Minnesota legislature amended the statute to specifically allow seat belt evidence in product's liability actions. See, Minn. Stat. §169.685 Subdivision 4 (1999). The court held that the statute precluded evidence of the use of a seat belt because the statute broadly [12 P.3d 465] extended to all injuries resulting from the use of a motor vehicle without limitations to accidents caused by defective automobiles. ¶17 Olson is distinguishable and unpersuasive. Under Minnesota's statutory scheme, the seat belt evidence statute was enacted as part of a measure which simultaneously required manufacturers to install seat belts in automobiles and required the mandatory use of seat belts. The Olson court reasoned that it was simply not clear that the Legislature intended to benefit motorists alone in enacting the seat belt evidence statute. The Legislature's ban on evidence of seat belt use might have logically been designed in part to shield manufacturers from lawsuits should state-mandated seat belts ultimately result in injuries to motorists. However, Oklahoma enacted its statutory requirements for the installation of seat belts in 1965,26 but did not pass 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420, until 1985 as part of the Mandatory Seat Belt Use Act.27 Had the Oklahoma Legislature simultaneously imposed burdens on manufacturers and occupants, Olson's reasoning, and the argument that the Legislature intended to benefit manufacturers as well as occupants by enacting the seat belt statute would be more persuasive. ¶18 The Supreme Court of Texas reached the opposite conclusion from Olson in Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. v. Glyn-Jones, 878 S.W.2d 132, 48 A.L.R. 5th 787 (1994), when it considered the application of a statute which prohibited the admissibility of evidence of the "[u]se or nonuse of a safety belt . . .in a civil trial" to a manufacturer's products liability claim for a defective seat belt restraint system.28 Bridgestone involved a plaintiff who was injured when her vehicle was struck by another car and her seat belt failed to restrain her. Upon impact, she was thrown about her vehicle, causing injury. ¶19 The Bridgestone plaintiff sued the manufacturer of the seat belt and shoulder harness system, asserting claims of breach of warranty and products liability. She alleged the seat belt and shoulder harness system as well as the driver's seat and seat track were designed and/or manufactured in a defective condition. The manufacturer moved for summary judgment arguing that because evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts was inadmissable in a civil trial, the plaintiff would be unable to prove an essential element of her products liability claim. ¶20 After considering the context of the entire statute, the Bridgestone court held that the statute was not intended to protect seat belt manufacturers from liability for defective restraint systems. The court reasoned that: 1) if the legislature intended to abolish crashworthiness actions against manufacturers of seat belts, it is unlikely it would have utilized a subsection of a traffic statute to effect such a change; and 2) the admissibility of evidence subsection of the statute was included in order to make clear that the sole legal sanction for the failure to wear a seat belt is the criminal penalty provided by the statute, and that the failure could not be used against the injured person in a civil trial.29 We find Bridgestone's reasoning persuasive. ¶21 If §12-420 were intended to apply to protect a manufacturer from liability for a defective seat belt, the statute would inexplicably create a new defense to products liability claims that neither the Legislature nor this Court has previously recognized. [12 P.3d 466] The effect of the statute would be to create an exception to products liability actions by extinguishing all claims for defective seat belts. In other words, when a consumer is injured as a result of defective automobile, or any part of it, the injured consumer could bring a products liability action against the automobile manufacturer unless the injury resulted from a defective seat belt.30 We are not convinced that the Legislature intended to protect a manufacturer from liability for a defective seat belt by merely preventing a person from being penalized in a civil proceeding, by connotations of fault, for choosing to refrain from wearing a seat belt. Consequently, we hold that the statute does not apply to a manufacturers' products liability action, and that the evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts may be introduced in a manufacturers' products liability action for a defective seat belt restraint system. CONCLUSION ¶22 In Comer v. Preferred Risk Mutual Ins. Co., 1999 OK 86, 991 P.2d 1006 , we held that 47 O.S. 1991 §12-42031 of the Oklahoma Mandatory Seat Belt Use Act clearly precludes the introduction of evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts to support a claim of negligence in a wrongful death action. However, the statute was not intended to apply to a manufacturers' products liability action. At issue in a defective seat belt products liability case is the condition of the seat belt, and not the conduct of the seat belt user. The entire Act is confined to regulation of the conduct of the driver or passenger of a passenger vehicle as seat belt users or nonusers. The purposes of the Act are to codify public policy of encouraging seat belt use and to make seat belt use mandatory for drivers and front-seat passengers by providing a penalty for nonuse. Section 12-420 expressly clarifies that the sole legal sanction for the failure to wear a seat belt is the fine imposed by the Act and that a person will not be penalized in a civil proceeding by connotations of fault for choosing not to wear a seat belt.32 To read the statute any more broadly would defeat the legislative intent. QUESTION ANSWERED. The question is answered as follows: 47 O.S. 1991 §12-420 prevents a person from being penalized in a civil proceeding for choosing not to wear a seat belt. However, it does not prohibit the introduction of evidence of the use or nonuse of seat belts in a manufacturers' liability action for a defective seat belt restraint system. SUMMERS, C.J., HARGRAVE, V.C.J., HODGES, LAVENDER, KAUGER, WATT, BOUDREAU, WINCHESTER, JJ., concur. FOOT