CHARLESTON – The West Virginia Intermediate Court of Appeals has sent a product liability case against Ford back to circuit court.
In a December 8 opinion, the ICA reversed the $7 million Kanawha Circuit Court jury verdict handed down last year and sent the case back down for a new trial. That jury had found Ford 99 percent at fault in the 2016 accident that killed 19-year-old Breanna Bumgarner in a Roane County accident involving her 2014 Mustang.
Bumgarner’s car was hit by a pickup truck on U.S. 33 near Spencer and caught fire, trapping her in the vehicle. Attorneys for Bumgarner’s family said the car’s brake fluid reservoir wasn’t adequately protected in the crash, causing the fire. The jury agreed.
But the ICA agreed with Ford’s appeal that stated such negligent design claims require proof of a reasonable alternative design and that the jury wasn’t properly instructed on that requirement.
“We conclude that the jury was not properly instructed as to the necessity of finding of an alternative feasible design, which was contrary to the law and fairness due to both parties,” Judge Thomas Scarr wrote. “Accordingly, we reverse the verdict against Ford and remand this case to the trial court for a new trial.
Bumgarner’s estate also said the design of Mustang’s seating area was defective because it allowed too much crush, keeping Bumgarner from exiting the vehicle after the crash. The jury was instructed to consider the brake fluid reservoir claim and the entrapment as separate theories and was asked to decide each issue separately on the verdict form.
The jury verdict said Ford “was negligent in designing the 2014 Ford Mustang with a defect because it was not reasonably safe in preventing leakage from the brake fluid reservoir in this accident” and that “this negligence was a proximate cause of Ms. Bumgarner’s death.” It also said Ford was not “negligent in designing the 2014 Mustang with a defect because it was not reasonably safe in preventing Ms. Bumgarner’s entrapment in this accident.”
The court entered judgment against Ford for $6,930,000 based on the jury verdict in favor of respondent. After the circuit court denied Ford’s post-trial motion for judgment as a matter of law or in the alternative for a new trial, Ford appealed to the ICA. It heard the oral arguments in September.
West Virginia Intermediate Court of Appeals case number 22-ICA-208 (Kanawha Circuit Court case number 18-C-182)
