A recent Texas Supreme Court decision says that when people intentionally misuse a product in a way that is obviously dangerous, the manufacturer is not liable for the injuries that result from that intentional misuse.
The decision came in Genie Industries v. Matak, and was was reported in a blog by attorney Deborah J. LaFetra of the Pacific Legal Foundation, which filed an amicus brief in the case.
The case arose when a church in Texas hired two electricians to install fiber optic cables and pipe in the church’s ceiling.
The church offered the men use of its Genie lift. [Editor's note: The lift is identified in the court document as a Genie AWP-40S pusharound lift, which needs its outriggers in place to work.]
The workers were fully trained on the machine, which has outriggers extending from its narrow base to stabilize it while the platform is extended 40 feet in the air. But a church employee suggested that instead of lowering the lift each time it needed to be moved to a new location in the room the electricians should instead retract the stabilizing outriggers and push the machine around while one of them stood at the top of the fully-raised lift.
The men intentionally misused the machine in violation of the lift’s operator's manual, its eye-level illustrated warnings, and a church supervisor’s verbal warnings. As anyone could have predicted, the lift tipped over and the electrician who was up on the platform died from his injuries.
The man's parents and estate representative sued Genie, the church, and the electric company. They argued that the electric lift was defectively designed because it failed to prevent intentional misuse. The lower court jury found Genie liable, and apportioned 55% of the fault to Genie, 20% to the church, 20% to the electric company, and 5% to the deceased worker—leaving Genie jointly and severally liable for 95% of the $1.3 million award.
The Texas Supreme Court, noting that over 100,000 lifts of the same general model have been sold worldwide with not one other instance of intentional destabilization of a fully-extended 40-foot lift, held that the “lift cannot be said in any sense to be unreasonably dangerous.”
The court commented on the extensive warnings provided by Genie and the flat-out obviousness of the danger that should have deterred the men. While respecting the constitutional role of juries, the court rejected the verdict in this case: “when the facts admit of only one reasonable conclusion, it is the rule of law that must supply the decision, lest jurors be given the very power from which they are intended to protect us, deciding for whatever reasons seem good to them who should and should not prevail.”
Attorney LaFetra summarized the decision's main point: "The bottom line is that tort law does not guarantee that a product will be risk free, only that it will not be unreasonably dangerous. Product users who fail to follow simple instructions and heed clear warnings, particularly when the risk of injury is apparent, reap what they sow; there is no societal obligation via tort law to compensate them."
Lift & Access is part of the Catalyst Communications Network publication family.
