Opinion ID: 608888
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: cigarette-smoke liability

Text: 12 Smith, Carbone and Reeves argue that it was error for the district court to preclude use of their cigarette-smoke theories of liability as a matter of law. Whether the shipowners were negligent in permitting and encouraging smoking in inadequately ventilated quarters, the plaintiffs maintain, is a question of fact appropriately decided by the jury. So too, they add, is the seaworthiness of a ship whose air is thick with unrelenting cigarette smoke. Plaintiffs contend that the district court should not have disposed of these issues as a matter of law. 13 We need not here reach the novel and difficult question whether a shipowner, by virtue of maintaining a ship dense with cigarette smoke generated by its occupants, may have breached its Jones Act duty of care or its maritime law duty to maintain a seaworthy ship. 3 Plaintiffs' counsel never sought to plead such potential liability although several years had passed since filing suit. Instead, they presented their cigarette-smoke theories of liability in an altogether off-hand manner, late in the trial proceedings. We conclude that the district court was well within its discretion to eliminate the issue as unworthy of trial. 14 In the interest of promoting efficient, coherent trials, the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure recognize a broad authority in district courts to distill the issues to be argued at trial. Toward that end, Rule 16 directs courts to use pretrial conferences to weed out unmeritorious claims and defenses before trial begins. By its own terms, the rule permits participants at a pretrial conference to take action with respect to the formulation and simplification of the issues, including the elimination of frivolous claims or defenses. Fed.R.Civ.P. 16(c)(1). The Advisory Committee notes underscore the court's authority to foreclose frivolous arguments: 15 The reference in Rule 16(c)(1) to formulation is intended to clarify and confirm the court's power to identify the litigable issues. It has been added in the hope of promoting efficiency and conserving judicial resources by identifying the real issues prior to trial.... The notion is emphasized by expressly authorizing the elimination of frivolous claims or defenses at a pretrial conference. There is no reason to require that this await a formal motion for summary judgment [or other formal process]. 16 Fed.R.Civ.P. 16 advisory committee's note; see also Mains v. United States, 508 F.2d 1251, 1259 (6th Cir.1975) (One of the purposes which the pretrial conference serves is to expedite disposition of cases by simplifying the issues and eliminating surprise.); In re Control Data Corporation Securities Litigation, 933 F.2d 616, 621 (8th Cir.1991) (Rule 16(c)(1) directs the parties to formulate and simplify the issues....) 17 Here, there is ample reason to regard the plaintiffs' belated attempt to rely upon the cigarette-smoke theory as inconsistent with the Committee notes accompanying Rule 16(c)(1), which place upon counsel a substantial responsibility for assisting the court in identifying the factual issues worthy of trial. Fed.R.Civ.P. 16 advisory committee's note; cf., Erff v. MarkHon Industries, Inc., 781 F.2d 613, 617 (7th Cir.1986) (Attorneys at a pre-trial conference must make a full and fair disclosure of their views as to what the real issues of the trial will be. [Citations omitted.]) 18 In this case, plaintiffs' counsel failed to present the district court with a basis to believe that the question--whether the defendant shipowners were responsible for the plaintiffs' smoking-related illnesses--warranted discussion at trial. To the contrary, plaintiffs' counsel's conduct indicated that he was not prepared to make the argument seriously. Although these cases had been pending for four years, the plaintiffs never identified shipboard cigarette smoke as a grounds for liability until two days after trial commenced. Neither their complaints--which claimed injuries resulting from exposure to asbestos and hazardous substances other than asbestos--nor any of their discovery materials or other pretrial documents named cigarette smoke as a cause of injury. 4 Additionally, the plaintiffs never made an offer of proof identifying any medical evidence regarding a connection between shipboard exposure to passive smoke and any plaintiff's illness; they named no medical experts and identified no expert reports on the issue of secondary smoke as a causal factor. Thus, for the four years leading up to trial, the parties and the court regarded the seamen's claims as assertions of exclusively asbestos-related injuries. While a party's tardiness in raising an issue may not always render the issue extraneous, tardiness coupled with other indications can raise doubts as to the seriousness with which that party is prepared to present the argument at trial. Here, those other indications exist. 19 We note, for example, the manner and context in which plaintiffs' counsel advanced his argument. First, he never made any formal motion, such as a motion to amend the complaints, to include tobacco smoke among the claimed theories of liability. Rather, as noted above, he raised the cigarette-smoke theory only in the context of an oral motion urging the court to exclude the defendant shipowners' evidence that the plaintiffs' cigarette smoking, rather than exposure to asbestos, caused their respiratory illnesses. If the court allowed the shipowners to argue that smoking caused these illnesses, counsel insisted, the plaintiffs should be permitted to argue that the shipowners were at least partly responsible. While arguing that motion, counsel provided no citation to supporting authority, nor any indication that he had procured any supporting evidence, such as medical experts or expert reports. Nor, after the court ruled on his motion, did he follow up with any written memorandum of facts and law or proffer of evidence urging the district court to reconsider. Indeed, plaintiffs' counsel has yet to point to any evidence that could be used to disentangle the claimed effects of passive shipboard smoke from the effects of tobacco smoke stemming from other sources. 5 In short, plaintiffs' counsel consistently has presented his tobacco theory in a manner indicating the argument is neither serious nor earnest. 20 Further still, counsel's remarks during the argument on his motion in limine suggest that he raised his tobacco theory merely as a tactical effort to persuade the shipowners not to offer--or the court not to permit--their defense: 21 [T]hey [the shipowners] are going to get these doctors to say he has a clean bill of health except he smokes cigarettes. 22