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Kawamata Farms Inc. v. United Agri Products12/11/1997
ct in favor of the Plaintiffs and against the Liability Defendants, finding liability under Counts I and II, in which the Plaintiffs had alleged negligence liability and strict liability, respectively, for the defective manufacture or design of Benlate. The jury also found liability under Count III for the Liability Defendants' breach of an express warranty on the label of Benlate.
With respect to the Tomono Plaintiffs' declaratory action and the Declaratory Defendants' counterclaim and cross-claims, the jury rendered a verdict in favor of the Plaintiffs and Liability Defendants, and against the Declaratory Defendants.
B. The Recall of Benlate 50 DF
The Liability Defendants formulated, manufactured, packaged, marketed, distributed, and/or sold Benlate 50 DF, a fungicide that the Plaintiffs applied to their plants and soil. On September 1, 1989, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a stop sale order that, at least temporarily, prohibited DuPont from selling certain lots of Benlate 50 DF because they were contaminated with the herbicide atrazine. Benlate 50 DF was deemed adulterated, and its sale constituted an unlawful act under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act, 7 U.S.C.S. ยงยง 136-136y (1992) (FIFRA). In March 1991, the EPA issued a second stop sale order prohibiting DuPont from selling atrazine-contaminated Benlate 50 DF. Benlate 50 DF was again deemed adulterated, and its sale, again, constituted an unlawful act under the FIFRA. On March 22, 1991, DuPont instituted a total recall of Benlate 50 DF, after which DuPont no longer sold Benlate 50 DF in the United States.
C. Pre-Trial Motions
Before trial, DuPont and the other Liability Defendants moved for partial summary judgment, asserting that the FIFRA preempted several of the Plaintiffs' claims. In particular, the Liability Defendants contended (1) that the FIFRA's federal regulatory scheme governing the warnings set forth on pesticide labeling and packaging prohibited state law from imposing additional warning requirements on labels and, thus, (2) that the FIFRA preempted the Plaintiffs' claims. The circuit court partially granted the Liability Defendants' motion for partial summary judgment regarding FIFRA preemption issues, dismissing the Plaintiffs' negligence and strict liability claims in Counts I and II to the limited extent that those claims related to inadequacies in the labeling and packaging of Benlate.
However, the circuit court did not grant the Liability Defendants' motion for partial summary judgment regarding preemption to the extent that the Plaintiffs were alleging liability in Counts I and II for the defective manufacture and design of Benlate. Furthermore, the circuit court expressly denied the Liability Defendants' motion for partial summary judgment regarding preemption issues with respect to the Plaintiffs' claim for breach of express warranty in Count III.
The Liability Defendants also moved for partial summary judgment to the extent that the Plaintiffs' express warranty claim in Count III sought to recover damages in excess of the limitation of liability provision within the express warranty on the Benlate label, which the circuit court denied. In denying this motion, the circuit court stated that "the Court finds as a matter of law that the Benlate products warranty disclaimers and limitation of remedies provisions are unconscionable under the facts of this case." As a result of this ruling, the circuit court eventually instructed the jury to disregard the limitation of liability provision within the express warranty on the Benlate label.
The Liability Defendants moved several times to have the c
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