Court Opinion

ID: 9769092
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 14:31:00.74444+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:54.127786
License: Public Domain

GREEN, Justice,
dissenting.
The jury’s verdict of no negligence or causation on the part of the plaintiff and the other defendants is so against the great weight and preponderance of the evidence that it is manifestly unjust. The case should be reversed and remanded for a new trial. Therefore, I respectfully dissent.
It is unchallenged that the tire in question exhibited adequate warnings against the very conduct of the plaintiff that caused the accident in which he was injured. That the plaintiff ignored the warnings is conclusive proof of his negligence.
There is also conclusive evidence of contributing causation on the part of appellant’s co-defendants, Ford and Budd. The evidence was undisputed that Ford and Budd had introduced 16.5" wheel rims into a marketplace where 16" tires were common, posing a potential for great harm to both the installers and users of 16" tires. There was also evidence that the rims were defective because they were not conspicuously marked as 16.5" rims, and that the defect was a cause of the accident. Evidence was introduced that the rims could easily have been designed in such a way to reject mismatched tires.
In support of the verdict, the majority disregards the great weight of the evidence of Ford and Budd’s causation, concluding that the jury was entitled to rely on the fact that the tire was the only product to “fail” in finding Goodrich 100% at fault. But it is clear from the evidence that the only reason the tire failed was because it was placed on a defective and mismatched rim. It did not fail because of a self-contained defect.
The greater weight and preponderance of the evidence establishes that the plaintiff, Ford and Budd were each, to some undetermined degree, the cause of the plaintiffs injuries. Accordingly, I would reverse and remand the case for a new trial.