Court Opinion

ID: 9691340
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 20:26:17.938725+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:17.150013
License: Public Domain

M. J. Kelly, P.J.
(dissenting). Leave to appeal should not have been granted in this case because it presents too close a question. I am not convinced that there is error that needs to be corrected. This ruling could have gone either way and either way would not have constituted an abuse of discretion. It is too close to call. I would affirm.
The parties and the majority are in agreement that the evidence sought to be discovered is not admissible. The answers to interrogatories 4, 5 and 6 are inadmissible to prove liability because the warning label in question was not used until after plaintiff’s injury. Evidence of a change in warning labels occurring after the date of the event on which the complaint for recovery is based is inadmissible to prove liability. MRE 407; Downey v Kent Products, Inc, 420 Mich 197; 362 NW2d 605 (1984), reh den 421 Mich 1202 (1985).
The answers to interrogatories 10 and 11 request information on "any injection molding machine manufactured and/or designed by Defendant wherein Plaintiff contended that he or she was injured in some manner by contact with the safety bar.” These interrogatories are not framed so as to limit the answers to the existence of similar facts under the same or substantially similar circumstances. Defendants answered interrogatories 10 *531and 11 insofar as they pertained to injuries or lawsuits involving the machine that injured plaintiff. Their refusal to provide information regarding different machines was a plausible limitation. There has to be some limitation on the information requested by a party or the opposition can be ground down by attrition over the interminable propounding of interrogatories.
So the question boils down to whether inadmissible information might lead to admissible evidence. Under MCR 2.302 plaintiff is required to show that the information is "reasonably calculated” to lead to discovery of admissible evidence. To carry that burden plaintiff asserts that the evidence "has a bearing on the feasibility of using warning labels.” Plaintiff also says that "the information may reveal that Defendant had notice of the defect in its injection molding presses, which knowledge has a direct bearing on Defendant’s duty to warn.” That doesn’t hit me in the forehead. I do not think the trial court erred in deciding, as it must have, that the nature and extent of the factual showing was deficient in demonstrating that the information sought was reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence. Certainly the feasibility of using a warning label can be proved by other means without violating the spirit of the rule that evidence of subsequent remedial measures is inadmissible. Plaintiff’s assertion that "notice of the defect” was an issue is just another way of saying that the evidence is sought to prove liability, which is impermissible.
In his appellate brief plaintiff asserts that the information sought "may reveal evidence of actual notice of a defect in design or manufacture, and could conceivably reveal specific acts of negligence for which Defendant would be liable.” If that is the standard of good cause then we will be here *532forever. It seems to me that the trial courts would not be remiss in requiring some minimal degree of specificity as to what admissible evidence may come to light through the discovery of inadmissible evidence. Merely saying that it may show negligence destroys the barrier between admissibility and discoverability. It encourages the old “fishing expedition” and, in the case of subsequent remedial measures, might even have a negative effect upon the will of manufacturers to take corrective measures.
I would affirm.