Wong v. Crown Equipment Corp.
Wong v. Crown Equipment Corp.
Opinion of the Court
This is an appeal by the plaintiff Irma Wong, as personal representative of the estate of Pedro Blanco, from an adverse final summary judgment entered in a wrongful death products liability action. We find no merit in the points raised on appeal and affirm.
First, the plaintiff contends that the summary judgment appealed from is procedurally defective because the defendants’ motion for summary judgment did not state with particularity a ground which was urged at the hearing on the motion for summary judgment. It appears that defendants’ counsel argued at the summary judgment hearing that because there were no eye witnesses to the subject accident, it would be impossible
Second, the plaintiff contends that on the record before the trial court the defendants were not otherwise entitled to summary judgment. The trial court in the order granting summary judgment for the defendants stated:
“Pedro Blanco, the decedent, allegedly fell from a piece of equipment known as a ‘stockpicker.’ There were no eyewitnesses to the alleged accident. The decedent did not recover consciousness and was unable to explain what happened. This action seeks recovery from defendants on a products liability theory.
In Adkins v. Economy Engineering Co., 495 So.2d 247 (Fla. 2nd D.C.A. 1986), a case in similar posture to the instant action, the court stated:
‘Because there is no competent evidence, direct or circumstantial, concerning the cause of the fall or where plaintiff was located or what he was doing when he fell, for plaintiffs cause of action to succeed it must be assumed that plaintiff was standing on the platform inside the railing, that for some reason he fell, and that the railings were too low to prevent his falling over the railings to the pavement below. However, other equally reasonable assumptions are possible, such as that plaintiff was sitting or standing or climbing on the railings, in which case the alleged low height of the railings would have had no effect on preventing the fall.
The plaintiff has the burden of proving his cause of action. In this case the record before the trial court failed to show the existence of any facts from which the jury could reasonably infer the cause of the accident.’
The same situation exists in the case sub judice. The only evidence plaintiff has produced is from an expert who opines that the piece of equipment can be made safer. While this may be the case, no evidence exists to sustain plaintiffs burden as to how the accident happened. In the absence of this evidence, plaintiffs cause of action must fail. See also Kroon v. Beech Aircraft Corp., 628 F.2d 891 (U.S.Ct. of Ap. 5th Cir. 1980). Plaintiffs reliance on Brown v. Glade & Grove Supply, Inc., 647 So.2d 1033 (Fla. 4th D.C.A. 1995) is misplaced.
Based on the foregoing, this Court concludes that no issue of material fact remains and that defendants are entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Defendants Motions for Summary Judgement are granted.”
R. 281.
We entirely agree with the trial court and disagree with the plaintiff. The record demonstrates that the plaintiffs decedent used the stockpicker to elevate himself about fifteen feet to access himself to certain shelves in a warehouse so that he could retrieve and replace certain merchandise on the shelves onto which he routinely walked.
Affirmed.
HUBBART and JORGENSON, JJ., concur.
Dissenting Opinion
(dissenting).
Blanco was found unconscious on the floor a short distance away from a fifteen-foot high “stockpieker” upon which he had been working and which was not equipped with the means reasonably required to prevent a fall. In my opinion, it is clear that these undisputed facts give rise to an eminently reasonable inference that he fell from the equipment at least partly because of the absence of those safety devices. See American Aerial Lift, Inc. v. Perez, 629 So.2d 169 (Fla. 3d DCA 1993), review denied, 659 So.2d 1085 (Fla. 1995). The point is made by a whole series of Florida decisions which are conceptually indistinguishable from the present one. In the leading case of Majeske v. Palm Beach Kennel Club, 117 So.2d 531 (Fla. 2d DCA 1959), cert. denied, 122 So.2d 408 (Fla. 1960), the court reversed a summary judgment entered on the ground that she could not say why she fell, against an invitee who had been injured on an allegedly defective stairway. Speaking through Justice Drew, the court stated:
The burden is upon the party moving for a summary judgment. Such party must make it appear that he is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law. Insofar as factual matters are concerned, doubts and inferences must be resolved against the mover. The defendant’s negligence in keeping and maintaining the steps in the manner described having been, on the motion for summary judgment, established, the question of whether such negligence was the proximate cause of the plaintiffs injury could be proven as conclusively by circumstantial as by parole evidence. Were this not the rule, the survivors of one killed in an accident where there are no eye witnesses would be precluded from recovery. Moreover, one rendered unconscious by an injury or having no knowledge of its cause or how it occurred would be placed in an untenable position with reference to proof. Circumstantial evidence, therefore, is clearly admissible. Where, as here, a prima facie case of negligence on the part of the defendant is made to appear, and the plaintiffs injury is clearly shown, a jury would be entitled, without speculating, to draw reasonable inferences from all pertinent and lawful evidence. It would certainly be reasonable to infer or to assume that the injured party in this cause did not deliberately and designedly fall, [e.s.] (footnotes omitted)
Majeske, 117 So.2d at 533-34. Similarly, we said in Fletcher v. Petman Enters., Inc., 324 So.2d 135 (Fla. 3d DCA 1975):
[W]e note that although plaintiff was unable to recall precisely what caused her fall, this fact would not entitle defendants to summary judgment in that the record reveals plaintiff fell to the driveway directly below the steps and the jury would be entitled to consider, without speculating, and draw all reasonable inferences from the pertinent evidence as to the proximate cause of plaintiffs injuries.
Fletcher, 324 So.2d at 136; accord Tucker Bros., Inc. v. Menard, 90 So.2d 908 (Fla. 1956) (evidence that child came home inexpli-
In any case, the defendants have surely not carried their burden, as is required to justify summary judgment, conclusively to demonstrate that their for-these-purposes-admittedly negligent failure to protect an employee from falling from their equipment played no part in his entirely foreseeable death. See Visingardi v. Tirone, 193 So.2d 601 (Fla. 1966); Holl v. Talcott, 191 So.2d 40 (Fla. 1966); Majeske, 117 So.2d at 531. As for the court’s quite speculative suggestions that Blanco may have fallen in some other quite unlikely way, op. at 983,
[i]t was not necessary for the plaintiff below to exclude the existence of other reasonable inferences of non-negligent causation in order to avert entry of a summary judgment. As pointed out in Voelker, 73 So.2d at 406:
... if the circumstances established by the evidence be susceptible of a reasonable inference or inferences which would authorize recovery and are also capable of an equally reasonable inference, or inferences, contra, a jury question is presented.
Goode, 425 So.2d at 1156.
I would reverse for trial.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Irma WONG, as Personal Representative of the Estate of Pedro Blanco v. CROWN EQUIPMENT CORPORATION and Life Systems, Inc.
- Cited By
- 5 cases
- Status
- Published