MT. OLIVET TABER. CHURCH v. Edwin L. Wiegand Div.

781 A.2d 1263

MOUNT OLIVET TABERNACLE CHURCH, Appellee v. EDWIN L. WIEGAND DIVISION, Emerson Electric Company, Appellants.

Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued February 27, 2001.

Filed August 13, 2001.

Reargument Denied October 19, 2001.

William H. Lamb, West Chester, for appellants.

Richard W. Yost, Philadelphia, for appellee.

Before DEL SOLE, President Judge, EAKIN and LALLY-GREEN, JJ.

LALLY-GREEN, J.

¶ 1 Appellant, the Emerson Electric Company, Wiegand Division,¹ appeals from the judgment entered October 18, 1999, in favor of Plaintiff/Appellee, Mount Olivet Tabernacle Church (the Church). We affirm.

¶ 2 The factual background of the case is as follows. Appellant manufactured and distributed a Chromalox Model TLC-210 Immersion Heater, which the Church used to heat water in a large baptismal pool. On November 26, 1994, a fire erupted in the Church building, causing extensive damage in the stipulated amount of $981,000.00. On November 22, 1996, the Church filed a complaint against Appellant, alleging that the heater was defective and that the heater caused the fire.

¶ 3 Specifically, the Church alleged the following. A church employee filled the baptismal font and turned on the heater. The water drained from the pool, but the heater did not shut off. The heater reached extremely high temperatures and burned the bottom of the empty baptistry; the fire then spread to other parts of the building. The Church further alleged that the heater was defectively designed because it lacked safety warnings and safety devices such as a thermocouple and a low-water shutoff.

¶ 4 The case proceeded to trial from May 10—May 14, 1999. The jury found that the heater was defective and that the heater was the proximate cause of the damage. The jury awarded $981,000.00 to the Church. Appellant's post-trial motions were filed on May 24, 1999, and denied on September 21, 1999. On October 18, 1999, judgment was entered on the verdict.² This appeal followed.³

¶ 5 Appellant raises three issues on appeal:

1. Whether the lower court committed reversible error warranting a new trial when it failed to properly instruct the jury, in accordance with controlling Pennsylvania precedent, that the product manufactured by Emerson was defective if—and only if—the product, at the time it left Emerson's control, was unsafe for its "intended use," rather than "unsafe for use" as the lower court erroneously instructed.

2. Whether the lower court committed reversible error and/or abused its discretion warranting JNOV or a new trial, when it failed to dismiss Plaintiff's claims, failed to grant Emerson's request for a spoliation inference jury instruction and/or failed to impose any sanction upon Plaintiff as a consequence of Plaintiff's intentional destruction of critical fire scene evidence, where that destruction prevented Emerson from identifying other potential causes of the fire and as a result, substantially prejudiced Emerson's ability to prepare a defense.

3. Whether the lower court abused its discretion or erred in permitting Plaintiff to introduce at trial highly prejudicial and inflammatory evidence of alleged other fires involving similar heaters thus suggesting to the jury that the subject product had been previously adjudicated a fire hazard, where the lower court ultimately ruled that the incidents were not similar at all.

Appellant's brief at 4.

¶ 6 First, Appellant argues that the trial court committed reversible error by instructing the jury that the jury must determine whether the heater was "safe for use," rather than "safe for its intended use." Appellants' Brief at 21. Specifically, Appellant claims that the omission of the word "intended" relieved the jury from determining "whether the heater was intended to be used for the purpose to which it was put." Id. Appellant further alleges that they presented at trial "substantial and uncontroverted testimony establish[ing] that use in a baptistry font was not an intended use of this heater." Id. at 22.

¶ 7 In the instant case, the challenged instruction in relevant part reads as follows: "If you find that the heater at the time it left the defendant's control lacked any element to make it safe for use or contained any condition that made it unsafe for use, then the heater was defective and the defendant is responsible for any harm caused by that defect." N.T., 5/14/99, at 1224-1225.

¶ 8 The purpose of a jury charge is to clarify the legal principles at issue. General Equip. Mfrs v. Westfield Ins. Co., 430 Pa.Super. 526, 635 A.2d 173, 184 (1993), appeal denied, 537 Pa. 663, 644 A.2d 1200 (1994). Thus, a jury instruction will be upheld if it accurately reflects the law and is sufficient to guide the jury in its deliberations. Von der Heide v. Commonwealth DOT, 553 Pa. 120, 718 A.2d 286, 289 (1998). It is well established that a trial judge is bound to charge the jury only on the law applicable to the factual parameters of a particular case and that it may not instruct the jury on inapplicable legal issues. Schaefer v. Stewartstown Dev. Co., 436 Pa.Super. 354, 647 A.2d 945, 947 (1994). "Thus, `instructions given to a jury must be confined to the issues raised in the pleadings and the facts developed by the evidence in support of such issues.'" Id., quoting, Heymann v. Electric Service Mfg. Co., 412 Pa. 338, 194 A.2d 429, 432 (1963).

¶ 9 As most recently stated by this court in Phillips v. Cricket Lighters, 2001 PA Super 109, ¶ 22, 773 A.2d 802: "There are three elements in [a] products liability action: 1) the product must be defective; 2) the defect must be a substantial factor in causing plaintiff's injuries; and 3) the defect must exist at the time the product left defendant's control." In certain cases, it is appropriate for the jury to be specifically instructed that the product must be made safe for its "intended use." Marshall v. Philadelphia Tramrail Co., 426 Pa.Super. 156, 626 A.2d 620, 626,appeal denied, 538 Pa. 635, 647 A.2d 511 (1993), citing, Azzarello v. Black Bros. Co., 480 Pa. 547, 391 A.2d 1020 (1978). On the other hand, inclusion of the word "intended" is not always necessary for a proper instruction. For example, where there is no evidence that the product was used in an improper or unintended manner, the trial court need not instruct the jury on "intended use." Id.; see also, Craley v. Jet Equip. & Tools, Inc., 2001 PA Super 171, ¶¶ 15-16; Sheehan v. Cincinnati Shaper Co., 382 Pa.Super. 579, 555 A.2d 1352, 1356,appeal denied, 523 Pa. 633, 564 A.2d 1261 (1989).

¶ 10 The record reflects that the intended use of the product was to heat liquids. Appellant's Director of Sales Engineering testified that the intended use of the product was to heat water or a water based solution. N.T., 5/13/99, at 823. Indeed, the product could be used to heat water in a baptistry. Id. Appellant generally does not know how purchasers will use the product after it is sold; however, "they could use it for almost anything that they wanted." Id. at 826-827.

¶ 11 Appellant's only other witness, a fire expert, opined that the fire did not begin in the baptistry. Id. at 888. Appellant's counsel stated in closing argument that the issue was not whether the product was intended for use in a baptistry:

Now, I told you in the beginning this case is not whether this is a baptistry heater or not. It's not. But the reality is that somebody put this into a system, added all this heavy duty wiring and these components and made it work just fine in this baptistry for more than twenty years. And it still would be working if it hadn't been for that fire.

N.T., 5/14/99, at 1187 (emphasis added). Appellant's counsel argued that the fire did not start in the baptistry, recounted the testimony offered by the fire expert and pointed to the evidence which bolstered the expert's opinion.

¶ 12 Thus, the testimony of Appellant's own witnesses and counsel's closing argument did not suggest an unintended use. Rather, Appellant sought to establish that: (1) the heater worked properly on the day of the fire; (2) the heater was not the cause of the fire; and (3) the fire started elsewhere in the church. Finally, as noted above, the intended use of the product was as a water heater. It is undisputed that the Church used the product as a water heater. Because the evidence did not support an instruction on intended use, the trial court did not err by failing to provide such an instruct on. See, Marshall and Craley. Appellant's first claim fails.

¶ 13 Appellant next asserts that the trial court erred in failing to provide any sanction for the spoliation of evidence.⁴ Unlike most cases involving spoliation, the product itself was not destroyed or missing. Rather, Appellant contends that the Church and/or its insurer intentionally and wrongfully destroyed the fire scene before providing Appellant with a full and fair opportunity to examine the scene. Appellant claims that it was severely prejudiced because its primary defense was that the fire started elsewhere in the church and not within the baptistry.

¶ 14 Specifically, Appellant argues as follows. Shortly after the November 26, 1994 fire, the Church knew that the heater was a "prime suspect" as the cause of the fire. The Church and its insurer developed this theory through expert reports and photographs, specifically targeting the heater as the source of the fire. After the Church settled with its insurer in November 1995, the Church and/or its insurer destroyed the fire scene and did not photograph or preserve evidence tending to establish other sources of the fire. Moreover, the insurer knew long before the scene was destroyed that it had a potential subrogation claim against Appellant. Indeed, the insurer brought the instant products liability action against Appellant, with the Church as the named plaintiff. The insurer first notified Appellant of its claim on September 30, 1996, after the fire scene had been demolished. For these reasons, ...