Opinion ID: 1191954
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: foreign safety standards

Text: ¶ 19 Slisze next contends that the district court abused its discretion by refusing to admit the testimony of the plaintiff's liability expert regarding the standards of foreign countries that prohibit the manufacture and sale of contact-trip nailers. As previously mentioned, questions regarding the relevance of evidence are reviewed for abuse of discretion. See Hall, 890 P.2d at 1028. We find that the lower court did not abuse its discretion in prohibiting the testimony, but we reject the grounds on which it made that determination. The district court rejected the foreign standards as inapplicable, establishing a bright-line rule against admitting foreign safety standards. We disagree with the district court's determination that foreign safety standards are always irrelevant, but affirm the exclusion of that evidence in this case on the ground that it was not reliable. ¶ 20 The record reveals that no foreign standards were actually produced and that the expert's testimony only referred generally to the laws of several European countries. No proffer was made of the foreign standards themselves, nor was there any indication that the witness was an expert as to those standards or their bases. Therefore, it was not an abuse of discretion for the court to refuse to admit the testimony.