Martha Hunt v. Home Depot, Inc. ( 2023 )

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 22-2437
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Martha Hunt, Personal Representative of the Estate of Tommy Lee Hunt,
Deceased and on behalf of the Wrongful Death Beneficiaries of Tommy Lee Hunt
lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff - Appellant
v.
Home Depot, Inc.; Home Depot U.S.A., Inc.; Telesteps Inc.; Regal Ideas Inc.
lllllllllllllllllllllDefendants - Appellees
Xin Wei Aluminum Products Co. Ltd
lllllllllllllllllllllDefendant
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Arkansas - Delta
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Submitted: February 14, 2023
Filed: June 22, 2023
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Before SMITH, Chief Judge, STRAS and KOBES, Circuit Judges.
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SMITH, Chief Judge.
Martha Hunt and her husband, Tommy Lee Hunt, purchased a ladder at Home
Depot some years ago. Mr. Hunt was found dead near the ladder with injuries
consistent with a fall. Mrs. Hunt sued Home Depot, alleging that a defect in a ladder
caused Mr. Hunt’s death. The district court1 granted summary judgment in favor of
Home Depot, concluding that Mrs. Hunt’s evidence was insufficient as a matter of
law to show causation. We affirm.
I. Background
Mr. Hunt, while attempting to replace a lightbulb at the New Light Baptist
Church in Helena, Arkansas, apparently fell from a ladder and hit his head on a
church pew. The Hunts purchased the Telesteps Model 16S ladder from Home Depot
11 years before the accident. Mrs. Hunt alleges that a defect in the ladder caused Mr.
Hunt to fall to his death.
Mrs. Hunt sued Home Depot,2 alleging products liability, strict liability,
negligence, breach of the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a
particular purpose, breach of express warranties, violation of American National
Standards Institute (ANSI) standards, wrongful death, and survival. She claimed that
a defect in the ladder caused Mr. Hunt’s death. Home Depot moved for summary
1
The Honorable Brian S. Miller, United States District Judge of the District
Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
2
We note that Mrs. Hunt named Home Depot, Inc.; Home Depot U.S.A., Inc.;
Telesteps Inc.; Regal Ideas Inc.; and Xin Wei Aluminum Products Co. Ltd, as
defendants. Xin Wei was dismissed early in the suit for lack of service. Although the
remaining defendants are all named as appellees, Mrs. Hunt’s claims on appeal are
only relevant to the dismissal of Home Depot U.S.A. So we decline to address any
challenges to the dismissal of the other appellees because “points not meaningfully
argued in an opening brief are waived.” Ahlberg v. Chrysler Corp., 481 F.3d 630, 634
(8th Cir. 2007). References to “Home Depot,” therefore, refer to Home Depot U.S.A.
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judgment, arguing, among other things, that Mrs. Hunt failed to support her claims
with sufficient evidence to enable a reasonable jury to find in her favor.
Both parties submitted expert opinion testimony from engineers. Mrs. Hunt
submitted the report of William R. Coleman. Coleman concluded that the ladder was
defective because “[t]he design of the telescoping mechanism allows the user to erect
the ladder with one or more telescoping segments not fully locked into their extended
position.” R. Doc. 49-2, at 9. He noted that a “user is unable to verify that all
telescoping sections are fully locked without climbing the ladder,” and that “[o]ne or
more of the telescoping sections can suddenly retract without warning the user when
standing on or climbing on the ladder.” Id. He suggested that this “sudden movement
or jolt,” id. at 7, could cause an unsuspecting user to lose their balance.
Coleman concluded that the ladder is “inherently wobbly” and exceeds the
maximum height allowed by ANSI. Id. at 9. Notably, however, Coleman also
concluded that “the ladder was fully opened and locked at the time of the accident,”
id. at 8, and that “[a]t this stage of the analysis, [he had] not identified defects in
materials, assembly or workmanship that caused or contributed to Mr. Hunt’s
accident,” id. at 9.
Home Depot submitted the report of Jon B. Ver Halen. Similar to Coleman, Ver
Halen concluded that “there is no reason to believe that the locks were not fully
engaged when Mr. Hunt had his accident.” R. Doc. 41-1, at 7. However, Ver Halen
further concluded that the ladder met all ANSI requirements when it was
manufactured but that “[t]he spreader bars had become damaged and broken before
the accident.” Id. at 8. He additionally opined that “[a]t the time of the accident, Mr.
Hunt fell backward off the ladder. The reactive force he applied to the ladder caused
it to fold up and topple over. If the spreaders had been intact, they would have
prevented the ladder from folding up and toppling over.” Id.
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Ver Halen also observed “exposed live wires where Mr. Hunt was working.”
Id. Ver Halen’s report provided photos of the chandelier that Mr. Hunt was working
on, which showed the socket of the bulb that he was replacing was blackened and had
exposed live wires. The other bulbs in the chandelier were illuminated, suggesting to
him the light was turned on when Mr. Hunt was working on it.
The district court granted Home Depot’s summary judgment motion. It
determined that “there is only speculation supporting [Mrs. Hunt’s] position that a
defect in the ladder caused Mr. Hunt’s fall and there is no evidence that Home Depot
USA’s negligence cause[d] Mr. Hunt’s death.” Hunt v. Home Depot Inc., No.
2:20-CV-00178-BSM, 2022 WL 2111652, at *2 (E.D. Ark. June 10, 2022). It further
determined that “nothing indicates the ladder showed signs of defective build before
it was found lying on the floor next to Mr. Hunt.” Id.On appeal, Mrs. Hunt asserts that she provided sufficient evidence that
establishes her claims against Home Depot, and, at a minimum, her evidence creates
a genuine dispute of material fact making a grant of summary judgment improper.
II. Discussion
“We review the grant of summary judgment de novo, viewing the facts in the
light most favorable to the non-moving party. Summary judgment is proper if there
is no genuine issue of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as
a matter of law.” Martin v. E-Z Mart Stores, Inc., 464 F.3d 827, 829 (8th Cir. 2006)
(citation omitted).
In a products liability case under Arkansas law, “a plaintiff must prove that the
product as supplied was defective so as to render it unreasonably dangerous and that
such defect was the proximate cause of the accident.” Yielding v. Chrysler Motor
Co.,783 S.W.2d 353, 355 (Ark. 1990).
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When viewing the facts in the light most favorable to Mrs. Hunt, the ladder was
defective in that it was not obvious whether it was fully locked, that it exceeded the
maximum height allowed by ANSI, and that is was unusually wobbly. Nonetheless,
the record fails to show that these defects singularly or in combination caused Mr.
Hunt to fall. First, both experts agree that the ladder was fully locked at the time of
the accident. Mrs. Hunt’s allegation that this was not obvious is insufficient to
establish a defect in the ladder that could have contributed to the fall.
As to the ANSI standards, we have rejected similar attempts to rely on such
violations. See Crawford v. Sears Roebuck & Co., 295 F.3d 884, 885 (8th Cir. 2002)
(“It is true that the expert pointed to a safety standard of the American National
Standards Institute that requires that a ladder be designed to withstand its rated load,
but that is a mere truism, not the kind of specific standard the violation of which can
rescue a products liability case from summary judgment.”).
Similarly, there is no evidence that the wobbly nature of the ladder caused Mr.
Hunt’s fall. Indeed, plaintiff’s expert Coleman concluded that “[a]t this stage of the
analysis, [he had] not identified defects in materials, assembly or workmanship that
caused or contributed to Mr. Hunt’s accident.” R. Doc. 49-2, at 9.
Mrs. Hunt argues that the ladder’s spreader bars were damaged prior to the
accident. Ver Halen agreed. However, Mrs. Hunt goes further by asserting, without
evidence, that the spreader bars were defective when the ladder was purchased.
Conversely, Coleman concluded that the spreader bars were intact and only became
deformed after the accident.
On this record, proof that defective spreader bars caused Mr. Hunt’s fall is
lacking. Assuming the spreader bars were intact before the accident and were
damaged by the accident, Hunt’s theory of a defective spreader bar being the cause
of the accident is unsound. Assuming the spreader bars were not intact prior to the
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accident, the ladder was still purchased eleven years prior to the accident. The
damage to the spreaders could have occurred at any point during that time, through
no fault of Home Depot. And Mrs. Hunt did not produce any evidence to the contrary.
In short, while it is reasonably believed that Mr. Hunt fell off the ladder and hit his
head on a church pew, proof of the cause of his fall remains speculative, which “is
insufficient to survive a motion for summary judgment.” Nat’l Bank of Com. of El
Dorado, Ark. v. Dow Chem. Co., 165 F.3d 602, 610 (8th Cir. 1999) (holding summary
judgement was properly granted in favor of defendants in products liability case
under Arkansas law because plaintiffs’ claims that product was defective and that
such defect caused plaintiffs’ injuries were “founded on speculation or suspicion”).
We have recognized that “an accident can occur in circumstances that are
sufficiently unusual to raise an inference that a design defect was at work.” Crawford,
295 F.3d at 886. “But before that can happen, a plaintiff must produce evidence that
tends to negate other causes of the observed failure.” Id. (holding evidence negating
other possible causes of an accident was necessary to avoid summary judgment when
a ladder was sold to a purchaser and the ladder’s history after its sale was unknown).
Here, Mrs. Hunt has failed to negate other causes of the accident. In addition
to the unaccounted-for 11-year period between the purchase of ladder and the
accident, Ver Halen hypothesized that an electrical malfunction may have caused the
fall. Mrs. Hunt replies that this sort of malfunction would have given Mr. Hunt
electrical burns, which were not observed by the coroner. However, a minor spark
that did not contact Mr. Hunt could have startled him and caused him to lose his
balance. Mrs. Hunt has provided no evidence to refute this.
Mrs. Hunt’s attempts to negate other possible causes fare no better. Mr. Hunt’s
medical records and an expert report from a doctor indicate that he could have
suffered “myocardial infarction, cerebrovascular accident, or sudden cardiac death.”
Appellee’s Br. at 32; see also R. Doc. 41-14, at 1–2. Mrs. Hunt points to the coroner’s
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report, which “lists ‘head and neck injuries,’ ‘blunt force impact to head,’ and ‘fall’
as suspected causes of death.” Appellant’s Br. at 14. Mrs. Hunt also notes that the
coroner’s report stated that Mr. Hunt had no chronic illnesses. But these pieces of
evidence are not mutually exclusive. A cardiac event could have caused Mr. Hunt to
fall and hit his head. Such a blow to his head could be the immediate cause of death
despite the cardiac event being the immediate cause of his fall. Hunt neither points
to nor has provided any evidence suggesting otherwise. As in Crawford, “[t]here is
no proof here sufficient ‘to induce the mind to pass beyond conjecture.’” 295 F.3d at
886 (quoting Campbell Soup Co. v. Gates, 889 S.W.2d 750, 753 (Ark. 1994)). Thus,
the district court did not err when it granted Home Depot’s motion for summary
judgment.
III. Conclusion
We affirm the district court’s order granting Home Depot’s motion for
summary judgment.
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