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Smith v. Ingersoll-Rand Co.12/29/2000
se there was no warning in the manual or on the compressor regarding the risk of falling doors.
Ingersoll-Rand removed the case to federal district court based on diversity jurisdiction. The case was then tried three different times. A fourth trial is currently pending.
The first trial ended in a hung jury. The second trial was bifurcated into a liability phase and a damages phase. The second jury was instructed on Smith's comparative negligence using an ordinary negligence standard. Smith argued that his own ordinary comparative negligence was irrelevant in a products liability suit. However, Ingersoll-Rand argued to the jury that Smith's failure to wear a hard hat and his propping the door open in an unsafe manner constituted ordinary comparative negligence sufficient to reduce his recovery.
The second trial resulted in a partially hung jury. The jury found that the air compressor was defective but was unable to reach a decision on legal causation or comparative negligence. Because, in the trial court's view, the jury had been unable to agree on comparative fault by Smith, the court directed a verdict in Smith's favor on the cause in fact issue, but reserved the legal causation question for retrial.
The third trial focused on damages issues, as well as comparative negligence. Once again, the district court instructed the jury on comparative negligence using an ordinary negligence standard over Smith's objections. The jury found Smith forty percent responsible for the accident and Ingersoll-Rand sixty percent responsible. The jury assessed Smith's total damages at $668,000.
Both parties appealed to the Ninth Circuit. Ingersoll-Rand argued that the issue of legal causation should have gone to the jury. Smith argued that Alaska law does not permit ordinary negligence to constitute comparative negligence in products liability cases.
The Ninth Circuit only addressed Ingersoll-Rand's arguments, holding that the district court erred in granting a judgment notwithstanding the verdict on legal causation and remanding the case for a trial on legal causation. The circuit court did not decide the other issues on appeal. It noted, however, that the question of whether ordinary negligence could constitute comparative negligence in a products liability case presented a "novel issue of Alaska law," particularly in light of the 1986 Tort Reform Act. The circuit court therefore recommended that the district court consider certifying this question to the Alaska Supreme Court.
On remand, the federal district court certified three questions to this court as described in the introduction. We accepted certification pursuant to Alaska Appellate Rule 407.
III. STANDARD OF REVIEW
A decision by this court upon certification from another court involves determinative questions of Alaska law for which there is no controlling precedent. In determining questions of law, we exercise our independent judgment and adopt "the rule of law that is most persuasive in light of precedent, reason, and policy."
In interpreting a statute's effect on prior case law, this court's "primary guide is the language used, construed in light of the purpose of the enactment." This court applies a "sliding scale approach" in statutory interpretation. "Under the sliding scale approach, the plainer the language of the statute, the more convincing contrary legislative history must be."
IV. DISCUSSION
A. Prior to the 1986 Tort Reform Act, Alaska Allowed Comparative Negligence as a Defense in Products Liability Actions Only Under Limited Circumstances.
In 1975 this court judicially ado
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