Products Liability Law Reporter

A federal district court held that Hyundai Motor America Corp. Service Co. was not liable to a driver who was seriously injured when he collided with the driver of a stolen Hyundai Elantra during a high-speed police pursuit.

Here, a teenaged boy allegedly stole a 2019 Hyundai Elantra and drove it at high speed during a police chase. He collided with motorist Donald Strench, who was severely injured in the collision. Strench sued Hyundai Motor America Corp. Service Co., alleging negligence, public and private nuisance, and violation of the Ohio Products Liability Act. The plaintiff argued that the defendant, unlike most auto manufacturers, had failed to install engine immobilizers and otherwise designed its cars with flaws that made Hyundais sold in the United States before 2021 especially prone to theft. The defendant moved to dismiss, arguing that the plaintiff had failed to demonstrate that its design or manufacturing practices were the proximate cause of his injuries. The defendant also asserted that the plaintiff had failed to allege the required elements of his products liability and nuisance claims.

Granting the motion, the district court noted that proximate cause was an element of all the plaintiff’s claims. Citing case law, the court found that Ohio law holds that a person or entity who makes a car easier to steal does not proximately cause injuries to a third person involved in a collision with the car thief. The negligent or reckless driving of the car thief is a new and independent cause that severs the chain of causation between the actions that made the car prone to theft and the third person’s injuries, the court said.

The court cited as well-reasoned and persuasive a decision involving a Kia Sportage, in which another district court concluded that a plaintiff had not sufficiently alleged that Kia’s failure to install anti-theft devices was the proximate cause of the plaintiff’s injuries. Here, the court concluded, the plaintiff had similarly failed to sufficiently allege proximate cause. Accordingly, his complaint must be dismissed in its entirety.

Citation: Strench v. Hyundai Motor Am. Corp. Serv. Co., 2024 WL 3178681 (S.D. Ohio June 26, 2024).

Comment: See also American Honda Motor Co. v. Milburn, 2024 WL 3210146 (Tex. June 28, 2024). There, Sarah Milburn was riding in the third-row middle seat of an Uber driver’s 2011 Honda Odyssey. Although Milburn fastened her seat belt by pulling the belt down from the ceiling across her body and attaching it to the buckle at her left hip, her lap remained unbelted. A pickup truck hit the minivan as it entered an intersection, causing it to overturn. Milburn, who suffered paralyzing injuries in the collision, sued American Honda Motor Co., Inc., among others, asserting products liability claims. Honda raised several affirmative defenses in its answer, pleading, among other things, that the Odyssey’s compliance with mandatory federal safety standards gave rise to a presumption of nonliability under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code §82.008. Under this section, a manufacturer is entitled to a rebuttable presumption that it is not liable in a products liability suit based on a product’s design where the manufacturer establishes that the design complied with applicable federal safety standards or regulations governing the product risk that allegedly resulted in harm. The jury awarded over $37 million, and the court denied Honda’s motion for new trial. An intermediate appellate court affirmed. Reversing and rendering judgment for the defense, the state high court found as a matter of law that the statutory presumption of nonliability applied here and that the plaintiff had failed to rebut this presumption.