Court Opinion

ID: 9646995
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:20:07.323276+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:44.553607
License: Public Domain

KENNEDY, Judge,
dissenting.
I am unable to agree with my estimable colleagues in their holding that plaintiffs failed to make a submissible case for punitive damages against Philip Carey. The effect of their opinion is that defendant’s knowledge of the defective product’s danger, in order to justify a punitive damages submission, is not merely “actual” knowledge, but is specific, exact and certain knowledge. I do not think the cases cited therein require proof of such a high order of understanding on the defendant’s part.
*753There was abundant evidence available to Philip Carey during the relevant period of time, and actually communicated to their officials, from which a jury could conclude — as they did — that Philip Carey knew of the hazard presented by use of asbestos. If Philip Carey knew of the hazard presented to its employees by their exposure to the material, the jury could believe from the evidence that it knew also of the hazard presented to others, who, like plaintiff, would be handling, cutting and sawing the material and freeing the asbestos fibers into the air in enclosed spaces. (Incidentally, I do not think Dr. Mancuso’s letter of October 26, 1964, was rendered meaningless by the redactions.) Viewing the evidence favorably to the verdict, it appears to me that Philip Carey’s knowledge of the hazard of asbestos could have been found by the jury to have reached a level at which its continued sale and distribution of the product showed, in the language of MAI 10.04, “complete indifference to or conscious disregard for the safety of others”.