Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alnd-7_13-cv-01342/USCOURTS-alnd-7_13-cv-01342-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 365
Nature of Suit: Personal Injury - Product Liability
Cause of Action: 28:1441 Petition for Removal

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

WESTERN DIVISION

JOE RODDA,

Plaintiff,

v.

JOY MINING MACHINERY;

MATRIC; MATRIC LIMITED;

EBM-PAPST, INC.,

Defendants.

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Case No. 7:13-CV-1342-SLB

MEMORANDUM OPINION

This case is before the court on defendant EBM-Papst, Inc.’s Motion to Dismiss (Pro

Tanto) Based Upon Spoliation of Evidence. (Doc. 22.) Upon consideration of the record, 1

the submissions of the parties, the arguments of counsel, and the relevant law, the court is

of the opinion that the Motion is due to be denied.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

This productsliability case arisesfrom an accident involving an alleged runaway mine

car. When the “shuttle car” crashed into the rib of a passageway, a large rock fell and pinned

plaintiff in the car. (Doc. 1-1 at 6 ¶ 29.) Plaintiff alleges that a defect in the car and its

component parts caused it to “thermal[] out” and malfunction. (Id. at ¶¶ 29-31.) Two such

parts are cooling fans manufactured by defendant EBM-Papst, Inc. (Id. at 3 ¶ 4.) Plaintiff was

 Reference to a document number, (“Doc. ___”), refers to the number assigned to each 1

document as it is filed in the court’s record.

FILED

 2014 Apr-15 AM 08:15

U.S. DISTRICT COURT

N.D. OF ALABAMA

Case 7:13-cv-01342-SLB Document 40 Filed 04/15/14 Page 1 of 9
severely injured. He spent at least thirty-one days in the intensive care unit of a hospital,

connected to a ventilator and a feeding tube, unable to move. (Doc. 33-2 ¶ 2.) Within a week

of being released from the hospital, plaintiff hired an attorney. (Id. at ¶ 2; doc. 33-1 at ¶ 3.)

Four dayslater, the attorney sent plaintiff’s employer, Drummond Company (“Drummond”),

a letter “requiring it to preserve the shuttle car and all its parts.” (Doc. 33-1 ¶¶ 3-4; doc. 1-1

at 4 ¶ 16.)

Nearly two years passed before plaintiff brought suit against a number of defendants,

including EBM-Papst, but not Drummond, plaintiff’s employer. (See doc. 1-2 at 4.)

According to EBM-Papst, “Drummond’s counsel’s office reports that the fans in question

were thrown out prior to receipt of an evidence preservation letter from the [p]laintiff,” and

“there is no reasonable expectation that the fans and connecting wires will be found or

recovered from disposal.” (Doc. 22 at 2.) EBM-Papst asserts that it never had the chance to

inspect the fans and that the inspections performed by other entities on the fans are

inadequate. (Id. at 6-8.) Plaintiff did not participate in the investigation of the accident, which

was apparently conducted by the Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health

Administration (“MSHA”), (see docs. 34-3, 34-4, and 34-5), nor did plaintiff take possession

of the fans or any other parts. (Doc. 33-2 ¶ 3.)

ANALYSIS

EBM-Papst (“defendant”) moves for dismissal based on spoliation of “the most

important piece of evidence” in the case against it: the fans it manufactured. (See doc. 22 at

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4.) Although it is an easy one, the first question is what law applies. As plaintiff notes, (doc.

33 at 5), “because spoliation sanctions constitute an evidentiarymatter,” federal law governs

even in diversity suits. Flury v. Daimler Chrysler Corp., 427 F.3d 939, 944 (11th Cir. 2005).

In 2005, the Eleventh Circuit had not yet “set forth specific guidelines” on spoliation

sanctions, so the court’s opinion in Flury was “informed by Georgia law,” as Georgia law

“provide[d]some guidance and was relied upon by the district court and the parties,” and was

“wholly consistent with federal spoliation principles.” Id. at 944. Defendant construes this

language to mean that the spoliation law of the forum state is the relevant law in federal

court. (See doc. 34 at 11) (“In [Flury], the Eleventh Circuit accepted the use of state

spoliation law, in that case Georgia law and in our case Alabama law.”) (emphasis added).

That was the exact proposition that Flury rejected. 427 F.3d at 943-44 (declining to follow

Nationwide Mutual Fire Ins. Co. v. Ford Motor Co., 174 F.3d 801, 804 (6th Cir. 1999), a

case overruled post-Flury by Adkins v. Wolever, 554 F.3d 650, 652 (6th Cir. 2009) (en

banc)). To clear up any confusion, the relevant law on spoliation sanctions in federal court 2

is the same whether the litigation is in Alabama, Georgia, or Florida, because it is always

federal law.

The court’s “broad discretion” to impose spoliation sanctions derives from its

“inherent power to manage its own affairs and to achieve the orderly and expeditious

The tort of spoliation is distinct. Cf. Smith v. Atkinson, 771 So. 2d 429 (Ala. 2

2000); Rowe v. City of Fort Lauderdale, 279 F.3d 1271, 1287-88 (11th Cir. 2002)

(analyzing plaintiff’s potential spoliation tort claim according to Florida law).

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disposition of cases.” Flury, 427 F.3d at 944. “[S]anctions for discovery abuses are intended

to prevent unfair prejudice to litigants and to insure the integrity of the discovery process.”

Id. Since dismissal is the ultimate sanction, it “should only be imposed where there is a

showing of bad faith and where lesser sanctions will not suffice.” Id.

Unfortunately for defendant, there is no going over or under that last sentence—got

to go through it. And judging from the Complaint, plaintiff’s affidavit, and the instant 3

Motion, plaintiff’s actions appear far from “bad.” Upon being released from the ICU, he

went forthwith to select an attorney, who promptly sent out a preservation letter. But

defendant essentially argues that all that is really required for dismissal is a breach of the duty

to preserve, and maybe not even a breach by a plaintiff him- or herself, but by an intervenor4

“workers’ compensation subrogation lienor,” Drummond. (See doc. 22 at 5.) As plaintiff

points out, (doc. 33 at 2-5), that is not what is taught by the cases defendant cites—Flury and

Cincinnati Insurance Company v. Synergy Gas, Inc., 585 So. 2d 822 (Ala. 1991)—or any

Eleventh Circuit case of which the court is aware. 

A few quotes from the two cases show how far defendant’s argument strays from its

Defendant tries to avoid it first by way of state precedent, stating that “Alabama law 3

contains no absolute requirement of bad faith for dismissal,” (doc. 34 at 11). As explained, that

way is blocked by the fact that federal law governs. Then defendant attacks it as dicta,

referencing the one-paragraph “Conclusion” at the end of Flury. (Id. at 12.) No go there either: as

will be explained more fully below, the Conclusion in Flury, 427 F.3d at 947, depends on the

“[p]laintiff’s spoliation” and the plaintiff (or someone acting as his legal agent) “inexplicably

ignor[ing]” defendant’s preservation letter.

Drummond’s Motion to Intervene, (doc. 39), currently pending before the court, will be 4

granted.

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Case 7:13-cv-01342-SLB Document 40 Filed 04/15/14 Page 4 of 9
authority. In Cincinnati Insurance Company, “the plaintiffs had deliberately disposed” of the

evidence, id. at 827, and the court noted that “‘willfulness’ on the part of the noncomplying

party is a key factor supporting a dismissal,” id. at 826 (emphasis added). In Flury, the

plaintiff “ignored” the defendant’s preservation letter and “allowed” the most important piece

of evidence to be sold for salvage, 427 F.3d at 945, conduct which the court describes as

“extraordinary,” id. at 943, and, considering the state of the remaining evidence, left

“potential for abuse,” id. at 946. By mentioning Drummond, defendant is probably trying to

liken plaintiff’s employer to the insurance company plaintiffs who “basically” stood to

recover whatever their co-plaintiff insureds would have in Cincinnati Insurance Company

and Smedley v. Capitol Chevrolet, Inc., 614 So. 2d 439 (Ala. 1993). But the circumstances

here, involving potential personal injury damages, are fundamentally different. Cf. Smedley,

614 So. 2d at 443 (“We point out that this is basically a subrogation claim brought by the

same insurance company that ordered the destruction of items that would have been crucial

evidence in that company’s action.”); Formosa v. Lowe’s Home Centers, Inc., 806 F. Supp.

2d 1181, 1190 (N.D. Ala. 2011) (noting that “[p]ain and suffering damages are not separately

allowable in worker’s compensation cases, but they are recoverable in [product liability]

claims”).

Other cases from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals put defendant’s argument to

rest. “While this circuit does not require a showing of malice in order to find bad faith, mere

negligence in losing or destroying records is not sufficient to draw an adverse inference.”

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Case 7:13-cv-01342-SLB Document 40 Filed 04/15/14 Page 5 of 9
Mann v. Taser Int’l, Inc., 588 F.3d 1291, 1310 (11th Cir. 2009); (see doc 33 at 3) (citing

Mann). In Mann and the case it cites, Bashir v. Amtrak, 119 F.3d 929, 931 (11th Cir. 1997), 5

the plaintiffs were asking the court to infer that because the defendants were missing a

particular piece of evidence, that evidence would have been favorable enough to create an

issue of fact. But that was too much of a leap under the circumstances in Bashir, where the

strength of defendant’s evidence otherwise entitled it to summary judgment. See id. at 932. 6

What the plaintiff needed was a bridge, some way of showing that the destruction of the

evidence was not just unfortunate, but suspicious. 

The usual way is by showing evidence of bad faith in the destruction, which implies

“consciousness of a weak case.” Id. at 931 (citations omitted). But the court suggested that

there might be other circumstances where a “wholly unexplained loss of evidence” warrants

“an inference of bad faith and thus an adverse inference.” Id. at 932. For example, where the

margin of error is tight. The court distinguished Stanton v. National Railroad Passenger

Corp., 849 F. Supp. 1524 (M.D. Ala. 1994), where the defendant’s “engineer testified that

at the time of the accident, the train was traveling only one mile per hour under the speed

limit.” Bashir, 119 F.3d at 932. Distinguishing Stanton on this basis implies that it was too

convenient for the defendant to be missing, inexplicably, the one piece of objective evidence

Although the difference between an adverse inference and dismissal might be relevant in 5

some circumstances, it is not here. 

In Mann, the issue of spoliation is hardly discussed. See Mann, 588 F.3d at 1310. This 6

court notes the case to show the ongoing vitality of Bashir, a pre-Flury case, and because

plaintiff brings it to the court’s attention. (Doc. 33 at 3.)

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(a speed-recording tape) that could have verified that the testimony was as accurate as it

needed to be. In Bashir, the defendant’s evidence on summary judgment was “exceedingly

strong,” and the standalone fact that the data tape from the train’s speed recording device was

inexplicably missing could not do the double work of inferring first that the tape’s

disappearance involved bad faith, and second that the data would have been favorable to

plaintiff. Bashir, 119 F.3d at 931-32.

In its reply brief, defendant suggests that because (1) Drummond’s subrogation lien

for workers’ compensation benefits paid to plaintiff makes “Drummond fully aligned

financially with [plaintiff] and against EBM-Papst,” and (2) Drummond lost the evidence,

“[a] permissible inference is that the [lost] evidence [would have] help[ed] EBM-Papst.”

(Doc. 34 at 10-11.) This gets it all backwards. The court has assumed, for purposes of this

Motion, that the evidence lost would have been favorable to defendant. But this is not

plaintiff’s ‘“put up or shut up’ moment” to show how he could prove his case. See Everroad

v. Scott Truck Systems, Inc., 604 F.3d 471, 476 (7th Cir. 2010) (describing the summary

judgmentstage). The inference defendant needs at this early stage—before even a Rule 16(b)

scheduling conference has taken place—is an inference of bad faith on the part of plaintiff

that could justify punishing him by dismissing his claims against defendant before he can

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argue their merit. And this inference in all likelihood needsto be not merely permissible, but 7

compelling. 

Defendant is correct to seize on the issue of fairness. (See doc. 22 at 6) (“In no way

can it ever be fair to judge EBM-Papst concerning fans that no longer exist and were never

sufficiently examined and tested.”). But the court does not yet have the evidence to determine

what will or will not “ever be fair” in this case. Plaintiff asserts that “[t]he existing

photographs, [MSHA] investigative reports and inspection notes present sufficient evidence

that the cooling fans in question malfunctioned due to physical damage.” (Doc. 33 at 7)

(footnotes omitted). They might, see Graham v. Teledyne-Continental Motors, 805 F.2d

1386, 1390 (9th Cir. 1986) (suggesting that a party’s “avenues . . . to obtain substantially

similar proof” may be sufficient when a government regulatory agency performs the

destructive testing of the evidence); defendant disagrees, of course. What is clear is that

details will be important. Once presented with the entire story, on a motion for summary

judgment or at the close of the evidence at trial, the court will be able to make 8

Defendant asserts that the court “could find bad faith as to Drummond,” but stops short 7

of asserting that the court could impute that potential bad faith to plaintiff through agency

principles. (Doc. 34 at 11); cf. Bouve & Mohr, LLC v. Banks, 618 S.E.2d 650, 654 (Ga. Ct. App.

2005) (“Sanctions may be imposed against a litigant based on a third party’s spoliation of

evidence if the third party acted as the litigant’s agent in destroying or failing to preserve the

evidence.”).

Plaintiff and EBM-Papst have each filed an affidavit of an expert, but the affidavits do 8

not flesh out the case like full discovery tends to do. Therefore, as discussed at oral argument, the

court will deny without prejudice plaintiff’s Motion to Strike the Affidavit of John Machnicki,

CFEI, (doc. 32), and defendant’s Motion to Strike Affidavit of George E. (Ted) Page, BSEE,

(doc. 35).

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determinations such as: (1) whether it is possible and fair for plaintiff to prove his case

against defendant based on the data actually gathered from the cooling fans; or (2) whether

this case presents an “other circumstance” left open in Bashir where an inference of bad faith

is warranted even though none is apparent. But demonstrable bad faith on the part of the

plaintiff is the only thing that might have rendered further factual development unnecessary,

and here, defendant does not even allege that plaintiff acted in bad faith. Therefore,

punishing plaintiff by dismissing his claims against defendant before he has the chance to

argue their merit is inappropriate.

CONCLUSION

Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss does not prove, or even directly allege, the elements

necessary to impose sanctions on plaintiff for spoliation. Therefore, the Motion is due to be

denied. An order in accordance will be entered contemporaneously with this Memorandum

Opinion.

DONE this 14th day of April, 2014.

SHARON LOVELACE BLACKBURN

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE 

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