Court Opinion

ID: 9704025
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:19:12.682555+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:54.809285
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GOLDENHERSH, dissenting: I dissent and would reverse the judgment and remand the cause for a new trial. As Justices Ward, Moran and I pointed out in our dissent in Woodill v. Parke Davis & Co. (1980), 79 Ill. 2d 26, 38, and Rucker v. Norfolk & Western Ry. Co. (1979), 77 Ill. 2d 434, 441, in an action based on strict liability, evidence of the defendant’s compliance with governmental requirements is irrelevant. The effect of the introduction of that type of evidence is to focus attention on the question whether the defendant was at fault. The question in a product liability case is not whether the defendant was at fault, but whether the product was defective. I agree with the majority that ordinarily there is, and properly should be, reluctance to modify an earlier decision soon after its adoption. But when the earlier decision is clearly and unmistakably erroneous, as was the decision in Rucker, it should be overruled as quickly as possible. WARD and MORAN, JJ., join in this dissent.