Because a seat belt connector was safe for its intended use when it left the manufacturer, the manufacturer was entitled to summary judgment on plaintiff’s failure to warn claim.
In Woodruff v. Ford Motor Company, No. E2023-00889-COA-R9-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. May 20, 2024), plaintiff’s husband was killed and her children were severely injured in a car accident. At the time of the accident, her husband was driving a Nissan vehicle. Her son sat in a booster seat in the back seat. Because the car had recessed seat belt receivers, the husband had added a seat belt extender to the back seat belt. The seat belt extender attached to the seat belt securing the son and his booster seat.
The seat belt extender bore defendant Ford’s brand on it. Ford worked with another company to design and create the extender, then sold it to Ford dealerships. The extender was intended to be used for adults who needed additional seat belt room in the front seat of a specific model of Ford vehicle. The extender in use by plaintiff’s son was purchased from a person who worked at a Ford dealership.
The extender included a tag warning that it should not be used “[u]nless it is physically required in order to wear the vehicle’s safety belt.” The husband’s Nissan owners’ manual included a warning to “never use seat belt extenders to install child restraints.” Further, the booster seat included a warning stating “if your vehicle belt is too short, contact your vehicle dealer for a seat belt extender.”
Plaintiff filed this products liability claim against Ford based on a failure to warn. Plaintiff argued that “the seat belt extender was defective because the on-product warning label failed to adequately communicate the danger of misusing the extender with child restraints.” Defendant moved for summary judgment, which the trial court denied. On appeal, that denial was reversed based on a 2021 Tennessee Supreme Court opinion.
Defendant Ford successfully argued on appeal that summary judgment was required pursuant to Coffman v. Armstrong International, Inc., 615 S.W.3d 888 (Tenn. 2021). In that case, the Tennessee Supreme Court held that a manufacturer did not have a duty to warn regarding the safety of certain equipment, even though the manufacturer knew and possibly intended that asbestos-containing components would later be integrated into the equipment. The Court held that “the language of the TPLA and accompanying case law places a duty to warn on a manufacturer or seller to warn about the condition of the product only if it was defective or unreasonably dangerous at the time the manufacturer transfers control of the product.” (quoting Coffman, 615 S.W.3d at 896).
In the present case, plaintiff’s two experts both agreed that the seat belt extender was not defective in and of itself, and that it was safe for its intended use. The danger came about when it was used in conjunction with the booster seat. Based on these facts, the Court of Appeals reasoned:
Ford is not a booster seat manufacturer, nor did it make, design, or sell the Dorel booster seat Ethan used. Further, the undisputed expert testimony in the record shows that Ford’s own product was safe for its normal, intended purpose of securing large adult passengers in the front seat of a Ford Focus. Plaintiff’s experts did not identify any design defect or manufacturing defect with Ford’s seat belt extender itself. Here, what made the extender unsafe and what created a dangerous condition was when the purchaser added, aftermarket, Dorel’s booster seat and Nissan’s Juke rear seat belt receptacles to the extender. Plaintiff claims that Ford had a duty to warn about the combined use of its seat belt extender with another manufacturer’s product, Dorel’s booster seat, as opposed to a duty to warn about some intrinsic feature of the actual extender. We find that Coffman’s explicit holding that ‘under the TPLA, manufacturers have no duty to warn with respect to products manufactured and sold by others’ applies to the facts of this action and to Plaintiff’s theory of Ford’s liability. We do not read Coffman’s holdings to be limited to cases about the post-sale integration of asbestos-laden component parts, as Plaintiff suggests. We have determined that Ford did not owe Plaintiff a legal duty to warn under the circumstances of this case. The existence of a legal duty is an essential element of the failure to warn claim under the TPLA. Therefore, the failure to warn claim articulated in the fourth amended complaint must be dismissed.
(internal citation omitted).
Plaintiff also presented evidence that Ford knew that consumers used seat belt extenders with child restraint systems. The Court rejected Plaintiff’s argument that this knowledge of possible misuse would change the analysis on Ford’s duty to warn.
Because Ford had no duty to warn, summary judgment on the failure to warn claim should have been granted. The trial court was reversed.
The Coffman case as it is interpreted here allows manufacturers to escape liability even if they know their product is likely to be used in an unsafe way. Coffman was decided over three years ago, and the Tennessee legislature has not chosen to address this issue.
The Court of Appeals released this opinion three months after oral arguments.