Dallas Court of Appeals, No. 05-19-00075-CV (June 3, 2021)
Section 82.008(a) of the CPRC provides a rebuttable presumption that a product manufacturer is not liable for injury caused by a product that complied with federal mandatory safety standards. The presumption can be rebutted under § 82.008(b) if the plaintiff proves that the federal standards are “inadequate to protect the public from unreasonable risk of injury” or that the manufacturer withheld or misrepresented information relevant to the federal government’s determination of adequacy of the safety standards or regulations at issue.
Toyota first argued that § 82.008(b) is preempted by federal law because it allows a jury to reject a federal agency’s determination of safety standards, but the Court held Toyota had waived that defense in the trial court.
The Court upheld the jury’s determination that the federal standards are inadequate to protect the public, particularly the standard regarding seat-back strength. It noted that all automakers greatly exceed the mandatory standard—in fact, the Toyota seats at issue exceeded the standard by over 700%—so the standard must be inadequate. The Court also held there was evidence to support a finding that Toyota withheld or misrepresented information relevant to the adequacy of the safety standard. In particular, the Court noted a letter from Toyota to two senators in 2016 in which it stated that Toyota had a “long and robust safety culture.” The Court found this statement misleading in light of a deferred prosecution agreement Toyota had entered into in 2014 over misrepresentations made with regard to sudden unintended acceleration in some of its vehicles. The Court also held the jury could have rationally concluded that Toyota was misleading in claiming that the NHTSA was an “effective regulator” in light of Toyota’s extensive lobbying efforts with the agency. With the § 82.008(a) presumption rebutted, the Court held the evidence was sufficient for the jury to conclude that Toyota’s design was unreasonably dangerous.
The Court also upheld the jury’s finding that Toyota failed to warn of the car’s dangers. Although the owner’s manual “strongly recommended” that children be placed in the rear seat, it did not warn of the danger that front seat occupants might be propelled into the back seat, injuring the children, in a rear-end collision.
Justice Schenck filed a dissent, noting that “the record reflects no evidence of any automobile that has been marketed with both the seatback strength necessary to avoid the injuries here and the proposed seatbelt changes that would protect front seat occupants.” He expressed skepticism that “every car ever marketed and sold to this point could be ‘defective’ and that their manufacturers could all be subject to exemplary damages on this basis.” He also took issue with the Court’s affirmance of a design defect without evidence that fewer injuries and deaths would result from an alternative design taking into account all potential crash scenarios, not just the rear-end collision at issue in this case. He noted that additional protections for rear-end crashes could cause additional injuries in front-end crashes. Justice Schenck would have held the plaintiffs failed to rebut the §82.008(a) presumption of no liability. He characterized the Court’s conclusion that the federal standards were inadequate as ipse dixit and noted that Toyota’s alleged misrepresentations to regulators were unrelated to seatback strength or seatbelt function and so were not relevant to the “safety standards or regulations at issue in the action” under §82.008(b)(2).
With the money at stake and the importance of the § 82.008(a) presumption to auto manufacturers like Toyota, expect this one to go to the Supreme Court of Texas.
