Court Opinion

ID: 9522487
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:26:49.607649+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:03:00.095755
License: Public Domain

Boyle, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part). 1 agree with parts i and in of the majority opinion. I respectfully disagree, however, with the majority’s adoption of the venue test for design defect cases. I would hold that a design defect *166cause of action arises, thus rendering venue proper, in the county in which the injury occurs or in the county in which the product enters the stream of commerce or the consumer purchases the allegedly defective product. Although the majority’s test commendably seeks a result that will minimize venue disputes, the means suggested will further protract discovery as attorneys seek the forum in which the likely factfinder is perceived to be most favorably disposed to their clients’ interests.
Venue for a tort claim may be proper in multiple counties. Lorencz v Ford Motor Co, 439 Mich 370; 483 NW2d 844 (1992). Primary venue for tort claims lies in a county in which all or part of a cause of action arose and in which the defendant resides, has a place of business, conducts business, or has a registered office. MCL 600.1629(1)(a); MSA 27A.1629(1)(a). The legislative history surrounding § 1629 indicates that the initial goal was to "eliminate forum shopping and the filing of only tangentially related lawsuits in Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb counties.” Lorencz at 373-374. While in Lorencz we recognized that the language the Legislature ultimately enacted failed to achieve this goal,1 as the majority notes, resolution of this issue should be guided by the underlying purpose of the Legislature.
In Lorencz, the defendant argued that venue was only proper in the county in which the injury occurred because that was the only county in which the cause of action arose. We rejected this argument and held that "a cause of action may arise in more than one place, making venue proper in more than one jurisdiction . . . ."Id. at 377. To illustrate how a breach of duty could arise *167in a different jurisdiction than the injury, we discussed a products liability action as an example:
[I]n a products liability action, the product can be designed in one county, manufactured in another, and the injury may occur in yet a third. A plaintiff, alleging proper facts, can file suit in any one of these places because all or part of the cause of action arose in any one of them. [Id. at 375.]
Lorencz involved two competing venues, Gratiot County, the place of the accident, and Wayne County. It was specifically claimed that venue was proper in Wayne County because "the car was defectively designed, manufactured, and assembled at Ford’s Wayne County facilities.” Id. at 372. Lorencz thus established only that a cause of action could arise in multiple counties. Venue is only proper in multiple counties, however, if all or part of the cause of action arose in different counties. Thus, the first step in determining where venue is proper is to identify the elements of the particular cause of action.
In Michigan, a manufacturer is liable for a defective design if the risk of harm occasioned by the design of the product outweighs the design’s utility. Prentis v Yale Mfg Co, 421 Mich 670; 365 NW2d 176 (1984). The risk-utility analysis adopted in Prentis is a pure negligence cause of action. Id. at 691. A design defect cause of action is not a separate or unique theory of recovery, but simply a particular type of negligence action.
The majority’s failure to identify the elements of a design defect cause of action leads to an improper focus on the perceived need to define "design.” The majority concludes "that the county most tangibly related to an alleged defect in design is the location where a design defect cause of action arises.” Ante at 160. This test is ambiguous *168and unnecessary. When the design and the manufacture of a product occur in different places, there is no need to determine the county in which the product was designed.
The proper focus is identifying the elements of the cause of action and deciding where each of them arose. A negligence cause of action has four elements. To prevail, a plaintiff must prove "(1) [t]he existence of a legal duty by defendant toward plaintiff; (2) the breach of such duty; (3) the proximate causal relation between the breach of such duty and an injury to the plaintiff; and (4) the plaintiff must have suffered damages.” Lorencz, supra at 375; Roulo v Automobile Club of Michigan, 386 Mich 324; 192 NW2d 237 (1971).
The elements of the design defect cause of action in this case can only arise in two possible counties. The duty, most easily stated in the negative, is not to provide a product if the product creates an "unreasonable risk of foreseeable injury.” Prentis at 693; Owens v Allis-Chalmers Corp, 414 Mich 413, 425; 326 NW2d 372 (1982). That duty and its breach may arise in the county in which the product was manufactured or the county in which the product was placed into the stream of commerce. However, since there is no free-standing duty not to design a defective product, no part of a cause of action for defective design occurs in the county where a product is designed. To state it otherwise, a design is necessary to a products liability action, but it is not sufficient to all or any part of the cause of action.2
There is no liability in the abstract for negligently designing a product or even manufacturing *169a negligently designed product. As noted by the Court of Appeals in Gauthier v Mayo, 77 Mich App 513, 515; 258 NW2d 748 (1977), "The underlying rationale of a product liability claim is that the manufacturer has á duty to place into the stream of commerce products free of defects and reasonably fit for the use intended, anticipated or reasonably foreseeable.” The duty arises and is breached no earlier than when the defective design becomes a defective product in the stream of commerce.
The second county where venue is proper is the county in which the accident occurs. The proximate cause of the injury and the injury itself can only arise in the county in which the product causes harm.
The Restatement of Torts and the Model Uniform Products Liability Act (upla) reach the same conclusion, but through different analyses. Neither the Restatement or the upla consider an object a product until it is introduced into the stream of commerce. In order for an object to be considered a product under the Restatement, the object must be sold. Restatement Torts, 2d, § 402A, pp 347-348. Pursuant to the upla, the object must be produced for introduction into trade or commerce. Upla, § 102(C). A product must be released in some manner to the consuming public or purchaser before it can be said to have entered the stream of commerce. Thomas v St Joseph Hosp, 618 SW2d 791 (Tex Civ App, 1981).
Determining that the designer/manufacturer breaches its duty in the county in which the product is sold or received by the injured party not only comports with the general concepts of negligence-based products liability, but decreases vexatious discovery litigation and fulfills the principles underlying the venue statute. As the majority *170accurately notes, "Venue rules traditionally have served to ensure that proceedings are held in the most convenient forum.” Ante at 155. The "goal is to minimize the costs of litigation not only by reducing the burdens on the parties, but also by considering the strains on the system as a whole.” Id. However, determining which county is "most tangibly related to an alleged defect in design,” ante at 160, introduces another complexity into design defect litigation. The additional inquiry is unrelated to the question whether the design was defective and places undue burdens on the parties and on the system.
While the majority attempts to discourage "[b]attles over venue that endure for years and are a great expense,” ante at 156, its test will escalate the war and shift the battle’s focus. Resources will be diverted from the complicated and often formidable task of unearthing evidence regarding a defendant’s knowledge of the defective nature of the product. The fight will continue over which county is "most tangibly related” to the design defect, an inquiry that necessarily will trace the entire history of the decision-making process and will require subsidiary contests about whether á given action in that process was a "decision” or merely a recommendation and whether the question is to be resolved by an objective standard or a subjective standard. Indeed, the dissent has already suggested a predictable gloss on the test by alluding to "the most meaningful design decisions,” post at 174. Discovery litigation and venue hearings will continue along the tortured path that has forestalled the trial of these cases.
Proper venue must be established before extensive discovery has taken place. The "plaintiff must determine which county is proper for venue purposes before the complaint is filed on the basis of *171facts then known to him. . . . The choice of venue must be based on fact, not speculation.” Marsh v Walter L Couse & Co, 179 Mich App 204, 208; 445 NW2d 204 (1989). If the defendant challenges the plaintiff’s choice of venue, it is the plaintiff’s burden to establish that the venue chosen is proper. Johnson v Simongton, 184 Mich App 186; 457 NW2d 129 (1990); Marsh, supra at 208. Determining which county is most tangibly related to the design of the product may well depend on evidence plaintiffs do not have access to when the action is filed. Plaintiffs, however, can establish with relative ease where the product entered the stream of commerce or where the product was purchased by plaintiff.
Generally, the county in which the plaintiff purchases a product is geographically closer to the plaintiff than the county in which the product was designed. Because "[v]enue is primarily a matter of convenience,” Peplinski v Employment Security Comm, 359 Mich 665, 668; 103 NW2d 454 (1960), and equity, Burlington N R Co v Ford, 504 US 648, 651; 112 S Ct 2184; 119 L Ed 2d 432 (1992), a county that is in proximity to the plaintiff is a more appropriate forum. With regard to the defendant’s interests, it is not inequitable to force the designer/manufacturer to defend a claim in such a county because a designer/manufacturer should expect to defend a lawsuit in any county in which its products enter the stream of commerce or are transferred within it.
The defendant’s interests are further protected in that the plaintiff’s venue selection is not absolute. If the defendant believes that another county is a more convenient forum, it can file a motion to transfer the action. MCR 2.222; MCL 600.1629(2); MSA 27A.1629(2). A more convenient county could be one in which the majority of the witnesses are *172located or where the bulk of the evidence giving rise to the claim is located. The defendant should bear the burden of establishing a more convenient forum in an alleged design defect case because it is in complete control of the data necessary to establish a more appropriate county.
This dispute can be resolved without recourse to an ambiguous and unwieldy definition of "design.” Accordingly, I would hold that when the product designer and the product manufacturer are the same entity, a cause of action for an alleged design defect arises for venue purposes either in the county in which the injury occurs, or in the county in which the product enters the stream of commerce or is purchased by the injured consumer. Accordingly, I would remand both cases to the tried court to determine the appropriate venue.

 See id. at 374.

 It is possible to imagine a situation in which the design defect is the faulty design itself. Imagine that a defendant’s business is selling plans for building go-carts to the general public. The hypothetical example does not detract from the point. Although the design itself is "the product,” there is no breach of duty until it is offered for sale.