Opinion ID: 195949
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Consideration of the Cumulative Effect of the Evidence

Text: 42 Appellant's argument depends on an implicit assumption that a claimant need not establish independently, by a preponderance of the evidence, any one of the three separate theories of strict liability (manufacturing defect, design defect, and warning defect). 43 In the context of this case, appellant argues that the evidence of failure to warn, although not sufficient by itself to support a finding of strict liability by a preponderance of the evidence, may be combined by the jury with any evidence of a design defect and may result in a finding of strict liability by a preponderance of the evidence. In some cases, this would lead to the anomalous result that the jury could find defendant strictly liable by a preponderance of evidence without finding by a preponderance of the evidence a manufacturing defect, a design defect, or a warning defect. 44 For example, the appellant implies that a plaintiff can prevail if the jury finds none of the three defects by a preponderance of the evidence and yet finds that the evidence shows a .40 probability of each and, in some unexplained way, a .51 probability of defect in its overall weighing of all evidence received at trial. 45 This argument is flawed. A .40 probability of each of three separate defects cannot add up to a .51 probability overall. Instead, in this assumed circumstance, unless the three are interdependent (as they may be), there is no better than a .064 probability (.40 X .40 X .40) that all three are true, and neither mathematically nor as a matter of common sense do three .40 probabilities show a .51 probability that one of the three or some combination of two or all three is true. 46 Moreover, as a matter of settled law, judicial opinions and commentators alike refer to proof of manufacturing defect, design defect, and warning defect as three different ways of proving product defect, not just as factors bearing upon one way of proving product defect. See Brochu, 642 F.2d at 661 (discussing separately the design-defect theory and the duty-to-warn theory with respect to jury instructions under New Hampshire law); Thibault, 395 A.2d at 846 (distinguishing policy factors bearing upon strict liability for manufacturing defect from those bearing upon strict liability for design defect and citing James A. Henderson, Jr., Judicial review of Manufacturers' Conscious Design Choices: The Limits of Adjudication, 73 Colum.L.Rev. 1531 (1973)); see also Restatement (Third) of Torts: Products Liability, Sec. 2 cmt. a, Tentative Draft No. 1 (Apr. 12, 1994) (setting forth separate standards of liability for manufacturing defects, design defects, and defects based on inadequate instructions or warnings, and explaining different sets of policy arguments and objectives for the separate standards); id., Reporters' Note, at 35-80 (explaining the Reporters' view that the formulation of separate standards for manufacturing, design, and warning defects is consistent with the weight of precedent); Oscar S. Gray, The Draft ALI Product Liability Proposals: Progress or Anachronism? 61 Tenn.L.Rev. 1105, 1108 (1994) (although criticizing the ALI Tentative Draft in other respects, accepting the point that the overwhelming body of interpretation by the courts has accepted the three-pronged differentiation between manufacturing, design, and warning defects). 47 Appellant cites Chellman as holding, or at least implying, that there is only one strict product liability theory in New Hampshire law, and that only one question about the adequacy of plaintiff's proof of strict liability should be submitted to a jury. A close reading of the case, however, does not support the view that Chellman addressed the choice between (a) treating manufacturing defect, design defect, and warning defect as separate theories, each involving a distinctive standard for determining liability, and (b) treating the three as merely factors in a single multiple-factors standard for making an evaluative determination that a product is or is not a defective product. 48 In Chellman, the defendant argued that strict liability for design defect and strict liability for failure to warn were distinct, and that the plaintiff had failed to plead a strict-liability-for-failure-to-warn claim. See Chellman, 637 A.2d at 151. In deciding that the plaintiff's complaint sufficiently stated a strict liability claim, on the basis of inadequate warning, to meet plaintiff's burden of pleading, see id., the court did not need to or purport to decide whether proving defective warning and proving defective design in respects apart from warning were two separable ways of proving strict product liability. Thus, Chellman neither endorses nor rejects the general proposition that manufacturing defect, design defect, and warning defect are commonly treated by courts and commentators as three separate ways of proving product liability. 49 The commonly accepted understanding that a plaintiff must establish one or another of the three kinds of defects (manufacturing defect, design defect, or warning defect) by a preponderance of the evidence leaves the jury entirely free to weigh a single item of evidence as relevant to claims of two or even all three kinds of defect. Thus, for example, New Hampshire case law supports the proposition that evidence concerning the existence and adequacy of a warning is relevant not only to a warning defect claim, but also to a design defect claim. See Chellman, 637 A.2d at 150; Reid v. Spadone Machine Co., 119 N.H. 457, 404 A.2d 1094, 1097 (1979) (This condition [the placement of certain buttons on a machine], coupled with inadequate warnings against two-person use, could properly be found to have made the machine 'unreasonably dangerous.' ). 50 The issue before us now, however, does not concern admissibility of evidence. The jury was free under the court's rulings, absent limiting instructions, to consider all evidence received at trial. In these circumstances, we conclude that the jury's finding of no violation as to the duty-to-warn negligence claim bars the strict-liability-duty-to-warn claim. This is so because in finding that there was no liability for failure to warn on the negligence theory the jury necessarily found either (1) that plaintiff failed to prove that the defendant's warnings and instructions violated the prudent care standard or (2) that, if the warning was inadequate, plaintiff failed to prove that the inadequacy of the warning caused the plaintiff's injury. 51 Under either of the two possible interpretations of the jury's finding, the jury has determined that plaintiff has failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence any violation of a duty of prudent care as to warning. This bars the strict-liability-as-to-warning claim unless the law of New Hampshire imposes a more onerous duty than one of prudent care as part of the law of strict product liability.