Opinion ID: 435307
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the strict liability claim

Text: 4 The Remington shotgun that injured Weeks was manufactured in August of 1968 and sold to a retail store in May of 1969. Weeks purchased the gun in August or September of 1969. Weeks was injured when the gun misfired in October of 1979. From these undisputed facts, the district court concluded that Weeks' strict liability claim was barred by the ten-year limitation period imposed by Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 51-1-11(b)(2) (1982). We agree. 5 In April of 1968, the state legislature approved the Georgia Products Liability Act. 1968 Ga.Laws 1166. Under the Act, any manufacturer of a product sold as new property could be held liable for injuries proximately caused by the product if, when sold, the product was not merchantable and reasonably suited to the use intended .... Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 51-1-11(b)(1). The primary thrust of the Act is to impose strict liability on manufacturers whose defective products cause injury. See Center Chemical Co. v. Parzini, 234 Ga. 868, 869-70, 218 S.E.2d 580, 581-82 (1975). 1 6 As originally enacted, Georgia's products liability statute placed no time limit on an injured consumer's strict liability claim against the product manufacturer. Compare Ga.Code Ann. Sec. 105-106 (1968) with Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 51-1-11 (1982). Thus, under the old law the maker of a product that causes injury forty or fifty years after its manufacture could be held strictly liable for that injury. Perhaps to alleviate the harshness of such a result, the Georgia Legislature amended the statute in 1978 to impose a ten-year limitation period on claims based on the Act. The amendment, which went into effect on July 1, 1978, see Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 1-3-4 (1982), provides: 7 No actions shall be commenced pursuant to this subsection with respect to an injury after ten years from the date of the first sale for use or consumption of the personal property causing or otherwise bringing about the injury. Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 51-1-11(b)(2) (1982). 2 8 Since Weeks commenced his products liability action more than ten years after he bought the gun, section 51-1-11(b)(2) bars his strict liability claim against Remington. In effect, Remington's exposure to strict liability claims based on Georgia's products liability statute expired ten years after Weeks bought the gun from the retail store that purchased the gun from Remington. After that time, section 51-1-11(b)(2) granted Remington repose from strict liability claims arising from this particular product. 9 Weeks disputes our application of section 51-1-11(b)(2) to the facts of this case. He argues that the ten-year limitation period cannot be applied to products sold before the Georgia Legislature added subsection (b)(2) to the Products Liability Act. To do so, Weeks contends, would violate the well-established principle of Georgia law that statutes are not to be given a retrospective operation, unless their language imperatively requires such construction. Bussey v. Bishop, 169 Ga. 251, 253, 150 S.E. 78, 79 (1929) (citation omitted); see also Code Ga.Ann. Sec. 1-3-5 (1982). 10 Although we have discovered no Georgia decision applying subsection (b)(2) to a claim arising from a product that was sold as new property before subsection (b)(2) became effective, we are confident that the Georgia courts, if confronted with the question, would hold the provision applicable. The Georgia courts long ago rejected any notion that statutes could never be applied retrospectively. As the Georgia Supreme Court emphasized: 11 [T]his court has definitively settled the law to be that our constitution forbids the passage of only those retroactive, or rather retrospective, laws which injuriously affect the vested rights of citizens. The general rule throughout the United States is that a State legislature may constitutionally repeal, alter, or modify state laws enacted under the police power for the protection of the public, without violating any express or implied constitutional prohibition against retroactive statutes. And the more especially is this true where no vested rights are disturbed. 12 Bullard v. Holman, 184 Ga. 788, 792, 193 S.E. 586, 588 (1937); see also Smith v. Abercrombie, 235 Ga. 741, 749, 221 S.E.2d 802, 809 (1975) (Georgia's prohibition against retroactive laws applies to vested rights.) (citation omitted); Armistead v. Cherokee County School District, 144 Ga.App. 178, 179, 241 S.E.2d 19, 21 (1977), cert. denied (The constitutional prohibition against retroactive laws applies only to those laws which affect or impair vested rights.) (citations omitted). 13 Adhering to the distinctions drawn by the cases cited above, the Georgia courts have determined that its rule against applying statutes retrospectively does not control where the cause of action has not accrued or vested at the time the statute became operative. U-Haul Co. v. Abreu & Robeson, Inc., 156 Ga.App. 72, 73, 274 S.E.2d 26, 27 (1980), aff'd on other grounds, 247 Ga. 565, 277 S.E.2d 497 (1981). Conversely, the rule prohibiting the retrospective operation of statutes forbids the application of a statutory limitation period to a cause of action that accrued before the statute went into effect. Jaro, Inc. v. Shields, 123 Ga.App. 391, 181 S.E.2d 110 (1971); see U-Haul Co. v. Abreu & Robeson, Inc., 156 Ga.App. at 73, 274 S.E.2d at 27. 14 In this case, Weeks had no strict liability claim against Remington at the time the statutory limitation period was added to Georgia's Products Liability Act. Subsection (b)(2) went into effect on July 1, 1978. Weeks was injured several months later, in October of 1978. Applying the statutory limitation period does not affect any accrued or vested right that Weeks might have in bringing an action against Remington. Therefore, the district court correctly determined that Weeks' strict liability claim is time-barred by Code Ga.Ann. Secs. 51-1-11(b)(2). 3