Opinion ID: 4195158
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: OSI Evidence

Text: Toyota argues that the district court erred by allowing the plaintiffs to present evidence of allegedly similar incidents experienced by other 1996 Toyota Camry drivers. “The decision whether to admit ‘similar-incident’ evidence is committed to the sound discretion of the district court,” Arabian Agri. Servs. Co. v. Chief Indus., Inc., 309 F.3d 479, 485 (8th Cir. 2002), and we will not overturn the decision to admit OSI evidence absent a clear and prejudicial abuse of discretion, see First Sec. Bank v. Union Pac. R.R. Co., 152 F.3d 877, 879 (8th Cir. 1998); Drabik v. StanleyBostitch, Inc., 997 F.2d 496, 508 (8th Cir. 1993). OSI evidence “may be relevant to prove the defendant’s notice of defects, the defendant’s ability to correct known defects, the magnitude of the danger, the product’s lack of safety for intended uses, or causation.” Lovett ex rel. Lovett v. Union Pac. R.R. Co., 201 F.3d 1074, 1081 (8th Cir. 2000); see Fed. R. Evid. 401 (evidence must be relevant).3 “Evidence of prior accidents is admissible only if the 3 The district court instructed the jury that it could consider the OSI evidence only to determine whether there was an unreasonably dangerous defect in Lee’s 1996 Camry. -8- proponent of the evidence shows that the accidents occurred under circumstances substantially similar to those at issue in the case at bar.” Hale v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co., 756 F.2d 1322, 1332 (8th Cir. 1985). An OSI need not “occur in precisely the same manner in order to qualify as being substantially similar.” Joy v. Bell Helicopter Textron, Inc., 999 F.2d 549, 554 (D.C. Cir. 1993). The district court permitted three witnesses to testify about purportedly similar incidents: Michael Frazier, Ronald Neumeister, and Patrick Powers. Michael Frazier testified that his family purchased a 1996 Camry in 1998. In September 2006, after his daughter reported a problem with the car, Frazier attempted to drive the Camry from Boston to Rhode Island—approximately 75 miles. Frazier explained that he drove the Camry through a tunnel in stop-and-go traffic with little need to use the accelerator; releasing his foot from the brake pedal was enough to let the car crawl forward. At one point when Frazier removed his foot from the brake pedal, the Camry lurched forward. Frazier testified that he tapped the gas pedal and the car returned to normal. The car lurched again 30 seconds later. Frazier again tapped the accelerator, keeping his left foot on the brake pedal, but the racing “got worse” each time, meaning the engine revved “even more.” Frazier put the car in neutral and turned off the engine in an attempt to gain control of the car, but the engine continued racing when he reignited it. Frazier had both feet on the brake pedal and used the full weight of his body to control the car with the brakes. When he was able to exit the tunnel and get to the side of the road, the Camry had caught fire. A mechanic told Frazier the cause of the revving was a “sticky valve.” The Camry had approximately 135,000 miles on it at the time of this incident. Ronald Neumeister testified that his family purchased a 1996 Camry in 1998 and drove it without incident until 2006. Then, Neumeister described an incident where he applied pressure to the gas pedal to accelerate up a highway on-ramp until he reached a speed of approximately 60 miles per hour. When Neumeister released his foot from the accelerator, the Camry continued accelerating. Neumeister testified -9- that he immediately checked to see if something had jammed the gas pedal, but found nothing unusual. Neumeister put the car in neutral and steered it to the side of the highway. After inspecting the car, Neumeister turned it back on and drove home. The Camry had over 100,000 miles on it at the time of this incident. Neumeister also testified that on several other occasions, the engine would accelerate immediately upon his starting the Camry, and that he experienced one other incident of unintended acceleration after applying pressure to the gas pedal while driving. Dr. Patrick Powers testified that he purchased a used 1996 Camry in 2000 or 2001. The Camry had approximately 160,000 miles on it when Powers purchased it. In 2008, Powers accelerated onto the freeway and then took his foot off the gas pedal, but the Camry continued accelerating. Thinking the gas pedal may be stuck, Powers tapped it with his foot. However, tapping the gas pedal caused the car to continue to “accelerate wide open,” “as if the gas was floored.” The brakes did not respond to normal pressure, and only responded slightly when Powers put both feet on the brake and applied the full weight of his body, which caused the car to smoke. Powers testified that his car accelerated to a speed of at least 95 miles per hour, with a maximum speed of perhaps 120 miles per hour. Powers attempted to put the car in neutral several times before he was successful. When Powers put the Camry in neutral the final time, he was able to regain control of the vehicle, coast to the side of the road, and turn the car off. After exiting the highway, Powers experienced several instances where the accelerator stuck at a particular speed, but did not accelerate independently. He testified on redirect examination that the brakes “had no measurable effect whatsoever” in the first two miles of the highway incident. On cross examination, Toyota elicited testimony from both Powers and Neumeister that the acceleration problem did not reappear after a mechanic cleaned the throttle body on each of their Camrys. However, the testimony of Frazier, Powers, and Neumeister established that these men and their mechanics were largely unable to identify the cause of the unintended acceleration. -10- Toyota argues that the plaintiffs failed to establish that the OSIs were caused by the same defect alleged in this case, and that the district court therefore abused its discretion in admitting the OSI evidence for the purpose of proving a defect. Toyota concedes that our court “has not held that proponents must show that the other-incidents were caused by the same or similar defect,” but argues that our “cases foreshadow that conclusion.” Our case law is well-established: Similar incident evidence is admissible only if the incidents “occurred under circumstances substantially similar to those at issue in the case at bar.” Hale, 756 F.2d at 1332. But “[t]here are no hard or fast rules as to what degree of similarity there must be to make the evidence admissible.” Henwood v. Chaney, 156 F.2d 392, 397 (8th Cir. 1946). Rather, in determining the admissibility of OSI evidence, the appropriate focus is on all of the “circumstances” surrounding the OSI evidence, not necessarily any specific similarity. See Torbit v. Ryder, 416 F.3d 898, 903 (8th Cir. 2005); Hale, 756 F.2d at 1332; see also U.S. Aviation Underwriters, Inc. v. Pilatus Bus. Aircraft, Ltd., 582 F.3d 1131, 1147–48 (10th Cir. 2009). We have, for example, found an abuse of discretion in allowing similar incident evidence when the facts showed that “the circumstances of the accidents differ[ed].” Hale, 756 F.2d at 1332 (district court improperly allowed evidence of prior accidents involving “explosive separation of RH5E rims, with no restriction as to the circumstances or the dates of the accidents”). Conversely, we have found no abuse of discretion in allowing OSI evidence when the district court concluded that the prior incidents “occurred under circumstances substantially similar to those” at issue in the case. Arabian Agric. Servs. Co., 309 F.3d at 485 (no abuse of discretion in allowing evidence of other collapsing silos; even if the court erred in refusing to give a limiting instruction regarding the OSI silos, there was no evidence of prejudice where the defendant was “afforded the opportunity to examine and cross-examine witnesses extensively regarding the” OSIs); see also Ahlberg v. Chrysler Corp., 481 F.3d 630, 637 (8th Cir. 2007) (district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding evidence of a prior accident unless it involved “(1) a Jeep or Dodge truck with an automatic -11- transmission manufactured [in a similar time frame], (2) with a key left in the ignition, and (3) a child under age four”); Lewy v. Remington Arms Co., 836 F.2d 1104, 1107–09 (8th Cir. 1988) (OSI evidence involving same-model firearms admissible, but incidents involving a different model were not admissible). The inquiry into whether other incident evidence occurred under similar circumstances to those in the case at hand is case-specific, and no one factor is dispositive. Here, the evidence showed that the circumstances surrounding each OSI and the incident in this case were similar in several respects. Each OSI witness testified that he drove a 1996 Camry with over 100,000 miles—just like Lee. Each witness testified that his Camry either accelerated or maintained its speed when he removed his foot from the gas pedal on at least one occasion—just like Lee. Each witness testified that the brakes were either ineffective or were very little help in reducing the Camrys’ speed—just like Lee. Each witness testified that the problem occurred spontaneously and unpredictably, and that he was unable to regain control of the Camry within 600 feet of first experiencing the acceleration—just like Lee. The plaintiffs’ expert, Dr. Stilson, reviewed the OSI evidence prior to trial, and was present for the testimony of both Neumeister and Frazier. He testified that he considered Frazier’s and Neumeister’s experiences to be similar to Lee’s. See Torbit, 416 F.3d at 903. We also note the careful attention the district court gave the OSI evidence, addressing Toyota’s argument regarding the exclusion of this testimony on at least three separate occasions. The court demonstrated a keen awareness of the potential dangers of admitting such evidence, explaining that it did not want the OSI evidence to “obscure from the liability case of the plaintiffs,” or “overcome the jury’s focus,” and that “jury confusion is an issue that [the court] wants to make sure [it] always has in mind.” The district court was in the best position to determine whether this evidence would be unduly distracting to the jurors in this case, see Olson v. Ford Motor Co., 481 F.3d 619, 623 (8th Cir. 2007), and it exercised cautious discretion in -12- limiting the number of OSI witnesses to three. We decline to require a series of minitrials on the causation of OSI evidence in order for the evidence to be admissible when, as here, the record demonstrates that the circumstances surrounding these OSIs were substantially similar to the incident at issue. Instead, in this case, questions as to the precise cause of the OSIs go toward the weight to be assigned the OSI evidence, not its admissibility. See Ahlberg, 481 F.3d at 637; Kehm v. Procter & Gamble Mfg. Co., 724 F.2d 613, 625–26 (8th Cir. 1983). A party is free to “argue to the jury that the evidence is not persuasive by pointing out dissimilarities” in the OSI evidence. Lewy, 836 F.2d at 1108; see also Joy, 999 F.2d at 554–55 (finding no abuse of discretion in admitting OSI evidence, even where “difference in the mode of failure weighs against” finding substantial similarity, where there are sufficient shared circumstances and when the evidence was offered to rebut defense theory). We remain mindful that admitting similar-incident evidence carries the risk of raising “extraneous controversial points, lead[ing] to a confusion of the issues, and present[ing] undue prejudice disproportionate to its usefulness.” First Sec. Bank, 152 F.3d at 879–80 (quoting Drabik, 997 F.2d at 508). In this case, the district court took those concerns into consideration before admitting evidence of a limited number of substantially similar incidents. In so doing, the district court did not abuse its discretion.