In Re Pacific Fertility Center Litigation

Background

Plaintiffs A.B., C.D., E.F., G.H., and I.J. brought a putative class action against Chart Industries asserting products-liability and negligent-failure-to-recall claims. The court had denied class certification, so the named plaintiffs proceeded to trial on their individual claims. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiffs on all claims and awarded more than $30 million in damages. Chart then filed a renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law under Rule 50(b) and a motion for a new trial under Rule 59.

The order concerns only Chart’s claims against it. The opinion states that plaintiffs’ claims against Pacific Fertility Center and related entities had been compelled to arbitration.

Judgment as a Matter of Law

The court denied Chart’s renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law. Under Rule 50(b), such a motion may succeed only when the evidence permits one reasonable conclusion and that conclusion is contrary to the jury’s verdict. The court must view the evidence favorably to the nonmoving party, draw reasonable inferences in that party’s favor, and avoid deciding witness credibility or weighing competing evidence.

Chart argued that the plaintiffs’ negligent-failure-to-recall-or-retrofit claim failed because they did not present expert testimony about what a reasonable manufacturer would have done. The court rejected that argument. It explained that California law generally requires expert testimony only when the causation issue is beyond the common experience of a jury. The court found that the causation issue at trial was not beyond a lay jury’s common understanding.

Chart also argued that the plaintiffs had to show that a government agency directed a recall. The court rejected that argument as unsupported by California authority. It concluded that the claim could be supported by evidence that Chart knew about the defect and the risk of harm, failed to recall or retrofit the controller, and that a reasonable seller would have acted differently.

The court identified substantial evidence supporting the verdict, including evidence that Chart knew the controllers had a “SN=0” defect that could prevent accurate monitoring of liquid-nitrogen levels; internally treated the problem as a critical, high-priority issue; had a retrofit available; did not notify Pacific Fertility Center or other customers or offer a retrofit; and knew the controllers were used with cryogenic tanks containing irreplaceable biological material. The court therefore held that the jury could reasonably find that a manufacturer under similar circumstances would have recalled the controller.

Motion for a New Trial

The court also denied Chart’s motion for a new trial. A new trial may be ordered when, among other reasons, the verdict is against the weight of the evidence, results from false evidence, would cause a miscarriage of justice, or is affected by erroneous evidentiary rulings or jury-instruction errors.

Evidentiary rulings. Chart challenged four evidentiary decisions. First, the court upheld its exclusion of Dr. Miller’s exemplar testing because the test did not adequately reproduce the conditions involved in the incident, including the tank’s contents and the type of crack. The court concluded that the test lacked a sufficiently reliable foundation and was not sufficiently relevant.

Second, the court upheld allowing plaintiffs to question Chart’s expert Ron Parrington about an email concerning a different tank implosion. The court found that Chart had opened the door by eliciting testimony that the Tank 4 incident was the only similar weld crack of which Parrington was aware. The email was not admitted, and Chart had an opportunity to question Parrington about it.

Third, the court upheld excluding evidence of low liquid-nitrogen readings in 2013 and 2014. Chart had not established that the witnesses knew about those readings, so the evidence did not properly rebut their testimony. The court also found the evidence too remote in time to be useful as evidence of prior acts and potentially misleading to the jury.

Fourth, the court rejected Chart’s contention that plaintiffs’ expert Dr. Kasbekar improperly testified about Chart’s documents, discovery responses, actions, or motives. The court found no improper testimony in the cited portions and noted that Chart could cross-examine the expert.

Attorney conduct. Chart identified nine alleged instances of misconduct by plaintiffs’ counsel, mostly involving comments about Chart witnesses appearing by video deposition rather than testifying live. The court concluded that the comments did not justify a new trial. Some comments drew objections that the court sustained, while others were not objected to at trial. The court found that the comments were tangential to the main issues, and that instructions telling the jury that lawyers’ arguments were not evidence reduced any possible prejudice.

The court also rejected Chart’s challenge to counsel’s statement that Dr. Miller had not conducted any tests. Although the statement was improper because Dr. Miller had conducted a test that the court excluded, the court sustained the objection and gave a corrective instruction. Considering the circumstances, the court found that the conduct did not sufficiently affect the trial to warrant a new trial.

Allocation of fault. The jury assigned 90% of the fault to Chart and 10% to Pacific Fertility Center. The court declined to consider arguments Chart raised for the first time in its reply brief. It further stated that, even if considered, the arguments would fail because they required substituting the court’s judgment for the jury’s and lacked evidence that required setting aside the allocation.

Noneconomic damages. Chart argued that the emotional-distress damages were excessive. The court rejected that argument, finding ample evidence supporting the awards, including each plaintiff’s testimony about trauma, anguish, grief, and the effects of losing the stored biological material. The different amounts awarded to the plaintiffs also indicated that the jury had considered each person’s evidence separately.

Disposition

The court denied Chart’s motion for judgment as a matter of law and denied Chart’s motion for a new trial. The order disposed of Docket Nos. 936 and 937.