Court Opinion

ID: 9620290
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:40:41.259695+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:49.004362
License: Public Domain

BUTTLER, P. J.,
dissenting.
Plaintiff was permitted to allege and to offer in evidence the ANSI safety standards that were applicable to defendant as a manufacturer. Although defendant was not required to comply with them, they formed the predicate for . the standard of care applicable to plaintiffs claim —common law negligence.
The rules promulgated under the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Code (OOSHC) and the Federal Occupational Safety Health Act (OSHA), both of which require employer but not manufacturer compliance, are substantially identical to the ANSI standards. The trial court did not permit plaintiff to allege or offer in evidence the OOSHC or OSHA regulations, because they were not applicable to defendant, a manufacturer.
Because the jury found that defendant was negligent, it must have found that defendant’s performance in the manufacture of the machine did not meet the ANSI standards. However, it also found that plaintiff was negligent and apportioned the negligence, 60% to plaintiff and 40% to defendant. I do not see how plaintiff would have been aided by relying on the OOSHC and OSHA rules; they are redundant of ANSI standards. If defendant was negligent under one, it was also negligent under the others — no more and no less. The trial court did not err but, even if it did, the error was harmless.
In holding that the trial court erred and that the error was not harmless, the majority says that plaintiff would have been entitled to argue to the jury that the OOSHC and OSHA rules were not just standards, as are ANSI standards, but could have argued that they are obligatory safeguards. It relies on Shahtout v. Emco Garbage Co., 298 Or 598, 605, 695 P2d 897 (1985), for that proposition. I do not agree that Shahtout would permit that kind of argument here, because defendant was not required to comply with those rules, whereas the defendant in Shahtout was required to comply.
*596Be that as it may, the jury found defendant negligent on the basis of the non-obligatory standards compiled in ANSI. Obviously, it was not impressed with defendant’s argument that they were only standards. There is nothing in the record that even suggests that defendant would have been found more negligent if plaintiff had been permitted to argue that the rules or standards were obligatory on defendant.
Plaintiffs job was to persuade the jury that defendant was negligent and that he was less negligent. He succeeded in the first but failed in the second. The error that he now claims, which the majority accepts, could not have made any difference in the outcome.
Accordingly, I dissent.