Opinion ID: 1295082
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Liability of Texaco

Text: Texaco bases its argument of non-liability as a matter of law upon two contentions. We find no merit in either contention for the reasons which follow. Underlying the first contention, Instruction 11 told the jury, in pertinent part, that if the buried cylinders involved an unreasonable risk of harm to others, and Philip Morris had reasonable opportunity to take effective precautions against it, Texaco would not be liable to the plaintiffs. The jury found against Texaco, but Texaco maintains that the undisputed evidence shows, as a matter of law, that Philip Morris did have a reasonable opportunity to take the necessary precautions. Texaco maintains that the instruction and Restatement (Second) of Torts §§ 366 and 373 (1965), upon which the instruction was based, require only that Philip Morris had had an opportunity to take effective precautions to prevent injury to others and not that it had had the additional opportunity to neutralize and dispose of the cylinders. Texaco argues that Philip Morris could have left the cylinders in the ground and thereby prevented injury to others. The difficulty with Texaco's position is that all the experts on chemicals testified at trial that the neutralization and disposition of the dangerous contents of the cylinders was required to prevent injury to others; the cylinders simply could not be left buried on the Philip Morris property without eventual danger to others. The jury, on disputed facts, found against Texaco on that issue, i.e., that Philip Morris did not have the required reasonable opportunity to take effective precautions. The evidence is sufficient to support that finding. Texaco next argues it is not liable as a matter of law because its negligence, if any, became a remote cause of the release of the pentaborane by reason of the superseding negligence of A-Line and Philip Morris. The issue of proximate cause was submitted to the jury and decided adversely to Texaco. The resolution of this question turns upon the foreseeability of the subsequent negligence of A-Line and Philip Morris. Relying upon a line of cases ending with Banks v. City of Richmond, 232 Va. 130, 348 S.E.2d 280 (1986), Texaco argues that its negligence could not be a proximate cause because Texaco could not reasonably have foreseen that a sophisticated company like Philip Morris would act so negligently ... The dominion and control that Philip Morris ... and A-Line exerted over the cylinders constituted a new, unexpected factor that was the real cause of the plaintiffs' injuries. In Banks, the extraordinary and unforeseeable manner by which the negligent actor later brought about the harm insulated the first negligent actor from liability. An apartment building maintenance man, responding to a tenant's complaint that her oven was not working, turned on the gas supply to the oven which the city had shut off months before. When the maintenance man smelled the odor of gas, he shut off the gas to the oven. Later, however, he lit a cigarette lighter to look inside the oven, causing an explosion. The city was charged with negligence in failing to disconnect the gas line to the entire unit months before, until the gas leak to the oven could be repaired. We held that it was extraordinary and unforeseeable that a person would reconnect the gas to the oven without investigating the reason why it had been disconnected and, more particularly, that a person, after having connected the gas and having smelled it, would later insert a lighted flame inside the oven. 232 Va. at 136, 348 S.E.2d at 283. Texaco knew it was dangerous to bury pentaborane in pressurized cylinders. Indeed, one of the dangers discussed by the witnesses, some of whom were Texaco employees, was the risk of injury when the cylinders were ultimately excavated. Texaco knew, or should have known, that the cylinders might be in a deteriorated condition when excavated and dangerous to neutralize. We believe that, unlike the situation in Banks, it was foreseeable that a person might be injured in a negligent attempt to dispose of the cylinders. Therefore, we find no merit in the argument of extraordinary intervening negligence. Moreover, we said in Coleman v. Blankenship Oil Co., 221 Va. 124, 131, 267 S.E. 2d 143, 147 (1980), that: In order to relieve a defendant of liability for his negligence, negligence intervening between the defendant's negligence and the injury `must so entirely supersede the operation of the defendant's negligence that it alone, without the defendant's [negligence contributing] thereto in the slightest degree, produces the injury.' Furthermore, an intervening cause is not a superseding cause if it was `put into operation by the defendant's wrongful act or omission.' (Citations omitted.) The evidence is compelling that Texaco's negligent act put into operation Philip Morris' efforts to neutralize and dispose of the cylinders. The trial court was correct in its refusal to set aside the verdict on these grounds.