Cases

A woman was run over an killed by a crane, and her estate brought suit against multiple defendants. One of the defendants was the company that sold the crane to its owner and agreed to keep it in good repair. That company did not design or manufacture the crane, did not have an employee operating it, and did not control the land where the accident occurred. However, a jury found it partially liable for the woman’s death. The district court reversed this verdict and remanded the case back to the trial court, holding that the company had not breached any duties to the woman. The district court held that the woman’s estate had not proven that the crane was defective when sold, that the company had failed to perform necessary repairs on a part of the crane that may have caused the accident, or that the company had any duty to warn the woman about the crane.

A company appealed a jury verdict for the plaintiff in a products liability case, arguing that its motion for a directed verdict should have been granted. The plaintiff alleged that the company’s failure to warn physicians that their prescription drug could cause inflammatory bowel syndrome was a substantial contributing cause to his developing that disorder. The district court reversed that verdict on appeal. Under the “learned intermediary” doctrine, a prescription drug company has a duty to warn physicians, not patients. The plaintiff’s prescribing physician testified at trial that he would have prescribed the drug in question even with the warning that the plaintiff argued should have been given. Thus, the district court held that the evidence to show proximate cause between the lack of warning and the plaintiff suffering from IBS was insufficient.

A patient filed a medical products liability lawsuit against petitioners a the manufacturer of a drug-eluting stent that was implanted in the patient and the manufacturer’s holding company. The manufacturer and the company petitioned for certiorari review of the denial of their motion to prohibit the patient from disclosing certain discovery to attorneys who were not counsel of record or even counsel in collateral litigation. The manufacturer produced, marketed, distributed and sold the stent. The patient's attorney advised the manufacturer of the patient's intent to disclose documents obtained in discovery to other attorneys. The manufacturer and the company then argued that the public, and attorneys not involved in collateral litigation but who were considering it in the future, did not have a right to access confidential information provided in discovery. The reviewing court found that the patient failed to present grounds for widespread sharing of discovery. He failed to show a need to broadly share the confidential information with counsel not of record and not engaged in collateral litigation. Indeed, counsel requesting the confidential information did not intervene in the case to present any argument to the trial court which justified the alleged need to obtain the discovery sought. All that the patient offered was speculation and opinion on why counsel might have been interested in the discovery for possible future use. The petition for writ of certiorari was granted, and the trial court order allowing the attorney to disclose confidential information to attorneys who were neither counsel of record in the underlying action nor counsel in collateral litigation involving the stent was quashed.

A woman was seriously injured when her van unexpectedly accelerated and struck a pole. She and her husband sued Ford Motor Company, alleging that a defect in the van caused the acceleration. The trial court ruled that their claims were barred by Florida's products liability statute of repose, § 95.031(2), Fla. Stat. (2003). The appeals court found that if the plaintiffs could prove that Ford had knowledge of the defect that caused the sudden acceleration and actively concealed that defect, the time period of such concealment would not count toward the twelve-year statutory period, § 95.031(2)(d). The trial court entered a summary judgment in favor of Ford despite plaintiffs’ presentation of evidence which, if believed by a jury, could establish or at least infer active concealment of the defect; therefore, the summary judgement was reversed by the appellate court.

The occupants of a motor home sued various parties, including a tire company, after sustaining injuries in an accident involving a motor home. The occupants alleged that the accident occurred when the tread on one of the motor home's tires separated. Claims against the company included negligence and strict liability as to the design and manufacture of the tire. The occupants requested various documents in discovery, which the company objected to as confidential trade secrets and business information. Fearing that it would lose the ability to assert that the Sunshine in Litigation Act was inapplicable to particular documents sought in the discovery requests, the company asserted that the blanket confidentiality order covering all documents that was entered by the trial court was improper because the court had not performed an in-camera inspection of any documents. There was a suggestion that the tires were a "public hazard" under the, therefore, the appellate court held that an in-camera inspection was required by the express terms of the Act. If the tires were a public hazard, the documents could not be the subject of a confidentiality order under § 69.081(2) and (7) of the Act.

Under § 774.204(1) of the Florida Asbestos and Silica Compensation Fairness Act, a claimant bringing an action for damages from exposure to asbestos had to plead and prove an existing malignancy or actual physical impairment for which asbestos exposure was a substantial contributing factor. The claimants argued that before the Act's adoption, it was merely necessary under common law for them to show that they had suffered an injury from an asbestos-related disease. As they filed their suits before the Act went into law in 2005, it could not be applied retroactively to bar their claims. The appellate court agreed. For each claimant, the cause of action had passed from an expectation to the accrual of the right to sue for damages. The invalid portions of the Act were not severable, and the Act in its entirety could not constitutionally be applied retroactively to require claimants with accrued causes of action for damages resulting from exposure to asbestos to plead and prove that any malignancy or physical impairment resulted from their exposure to asbestos. Instead, their accrued causes of action required them to show only that they suffered an injury from an asbestos-related, non-malignant disease.