Court Opinion

ID: 9551249
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:50:07.249209+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:23:24.197805
License: Public Domain

Brachtenbach, J.
(concurring) — While I concur in the majority opinion, I would clarify the burden of proof rule under Restatement (Second) of Torts § 402A.
Whether it be an exception to that rule, or a refinement thereof, I would hold that a plaintiff has met fully his burden of proof under the cited section when he proves, ¡as did plaintiff here, that the device arrived in the factory *467carton and that the user made no change in the device which could have caused the defect. It was uncontradicted that the YMCA made no change in the method of fastening the bar or rail to the saddle. Further, the equipment supervisor of the YMCA said there was no reason to make any such change.
The exception or refinement should then shift the burden to the manufacturer to prove that the cause of the defect was some event or condition for which the manufacturer was not responsible. In effect this is what the majority opinion holds by stating that defendant failed to overturn the plaintiff’s evidence. Perhaps that is even the logical consequence of the cited section, but I would spell it out in certain terms.
In this case, the same result would be reached as under the majority opinion. The most that the manufacturer proved, under the burden of proof which I would assign to it, was the speculative theory that the bars could not have been so assembled in its plant. The majority is correct that this is too speculative to meet the burden which I would place upon the manufacturer under these circumstances.
A manufacturer, under a record such as this, should be required to produce in support of his burden of proof evidence more substantial than the testimony that the defective device could not have been produced or shipped in such condition. A manufacturer’s self-serving testimony that a defective product could not have been produced in its plant because it never produces defective products should not carry the issue to the trier of the fact.
Finley, Stafford, and Wright, JJ., concur with Brach-TENBACH, J.