CASE NOTE: Brown v. Crown Equipment Corporation
By Elliott Teel
One question before the Maine Supreme Judicial Court in this case was whether or not Maine imposes a duty on manufacturers to warn of problems with their product after it has been sold.
The facts of the case show that the manufacturer of forklifts, Crown Equipment, became aware of a design defect that had caused serious injury and even death in several cases. In response to this problem, the company produced a kit in 1995 that prevented injuries from occurring. Essentially the company simply had a piece of metal designed that needed to be added to it’s forklifts in order to prevent injuries. However, despite producing the item that would have prevented further injuries and death, they failed to make sure that they were actually used, or even properly inform the forklift owners of the problem.
Robert Brown was operating one of these forklifts while working for a tanning company. The forklift had been purchased second-hand, however Crown still was aware of the use of the particular forklift, and had even “performed an evaluation” on it. So despite knowing that use of the forklift could result in deadly accidents, and knowing that this particular forklift had not had the corrective work done to it, Crown made no effort to have the modification done to the forklift. In August of 2006, Mr. Brown was killed while operating the forklift after suffering the exact injury Crown was aware had occurred over fifty times already.
The Court in Maine found that Crown had a duty to warn of the defect in their forklifts. Their failure to adequately address the problem through a recall or proper notification to the forklift owners violated that duty, and they were found liable for Mr. Brown’s death. The Court noted however that they were not adopting a broader, absolute rule about the duty to warn, but only on the facts of this case.
0 Comments