Court Opinion

ID: 9745652
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 23:16:16.089867+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:03.776030
License: Public Domain

Mr. JUSTICE CRAVEN dissenting: In this case the plaintiff presented virtually uncontradicted evidence to establish the existence of a product in a defective condition; that the product was defective at the time it left the seller’s control; and the existence of a causal relationship between the defect and the plaintiff’s injuries. There is no controversy but that the steel bands around this bundle of nailable steel flooring were loose. Whether they were loose because they were put on that way or because of the subsequent drying out of green wood is immaterial. They were loose and the looseness is a defect. The defendant knew or clearly should have known the nature of the handling that would be required with reference to its product. The evidence does not establish that it was handled in any unusual, and certainly in no unreasonable, manner. Richard Brosky, the operator of the fork lift truck, in his testimony described the movement of the bundles in and through a congested work area, over railroad tracks, and he described the fact that the left front fork wheel went into a hole — a hole located right under or by the tracks and the hole was only two or three inches deep and some twelve or eighteen inches across. The driving of the wheel into such a relatively minor depression caused the bundle to tilt and the sheets of steel to slide out. The plaintiff, totally unaware of this operation and located twenty to thirty feet from it, sustained injuries when the sheets of steel flooring spilled out as is described in the majority opinion * * * like a deck of cards.” This use and handling of the product was certainly foreseeable and at most did present a factual issue for the jury. It certainly is not a misuse by the plaintiff’s co-worker so as to insulate the defendant from liability. The majority state that the defendant’s lack of liability is predicated upon the proposition that there is no duty to a bystander as shown by this evidence so far as the manufacturer is concerned. The application of the doctrine of strict liability as to bystanders is extensively discussed in an article in the University of Chicago Law Record, Volume 38, at page 625 (1971). The cases relevant to the issue are there collected. In discussing Elmore v. American Motors Corp., 70 Calif.2d 578, 451 P.2d 84, the author states: “The court then stated four points which together constitute the clearest and most comprehensive judicial analysis of bystander recovery to date: (1) The public policy rationale underlying strict tort liability as announced in Greenman is equally applicable in bystander cases; (2) since strict tort liability applies even in the fact of attempted disclaimer, the doctrine may not be limited on the theory that no representation of safety is made to the bystander; (3) injury to a bystander is often foreseeable by the manufacturer and restriction on bystander recovery is but a vestige of the disappearing privity requirement; and (4) bystanders should receive greater protection than consumers and users, who may inspect for defects and purchase selectively.” Upon the disappearance of the concept of privity as a condition precedent to recovery, no valid reason has been suggested why an innocent bystander injured by a defect in the defendant’s product cannot recover. In Mieher v. Brown, 3 Ill.App.3d 802, 278 N.E.2d 869, (leave to appeal allowed May 23, 1972), Mr. Justice Simkins, speaking for a unanimous Fifth District Appellate Court, collects and discusses the cases relating to a manufacturer’s liability to an innocent bystander for a defective product. I very much agree with the observations, holdings, and rationale in the Mieher opinion that specifically determines that a bystander or non-user is not, simply by reason of that status, barred from seeking recovery from the manufacturer of a product. The majority opinion further suggests that the misuse here, as a matter of law, was unforeseeable. Such determination is difficult to understand in view of our holding in Dunham v. Vaughn & Bushnell Mfg. Co., 86 Ill.App.2d 315, 229 N.E.2d 684 affd. 42 Ill.2d 339, 247 N.E.2d 401, that foreseeability of careless use is a matter for the jury. As our Supreme Court noted in Lance v. Senior, 36 Ill.2d 516, 224 N.E.2d 231, after the event, hindsight makes every occurrence foreseeable. Clearly there was some risk in the way the product was handled and there was some likelihood of injury. The burden of guarding against it, however, would have been slight and in any event the misuse here by one other than the plaintiff is hardly such as to equal non-liability as a matter of law. The thrust of the special concurring opinion seems to be that the user had knowledge of the defective condition; that the subsequent handling of the product with that knowledge constitutes, apparently as a matter of law, assumption of the risk and that such assumption of the risk is somehow or another imputed to the innocent bystander. It seems to me that such theory should be rejected. As observed by the court in White v. Jeffrey Gallion, Inc., 326 F.Supp. 751, and quoted with approval in Mieher, it seems incongruous to say that a user or consumer has a right of action against a manufacturer of a defective product but an innocent bystander who has suffered injuries from no fault of his own has no such right of action. Thus, as I see it, the special concurring opinion resurrects the doctrine of privity and in so doing retreats from the philosophy found in Suvada v. White Motor Company, 32 Ill.2d 612, 210 N.E.2d 182, and, seemingly, interposes assumption of the risk by the user as an absolute bar to recovery by a non-user bystander as a matter of law. There are many other complex issues in this case relating to the third party complaint, the issue of active and passive negligence under Indiana law, all of which were resolved by the trial court in a comprehensive and scholarly opinion. There is no error in this record warranting appellate interference. The judgment entered upon the verdict should be affirmed.