Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. v. Mendez

Supreme Court of Texas · Torts

TortsProducts liabilityManufacturing defectExpert testimonymanufacturing defectexpert reliabilityRule 702Robinson factors

Facts

Oscar Mendez was driving a minivan when the left rear Cooper Tire steel-belted radial tire lost its tread, causing a rollover that killed four passengers and injured others. Examination of the tire revealed a nail hole that had penetrated completely through the tire. Plaintiffs sued only on the theory that the tread separation resulted from a manufacturing defect, specifically contamination of the tire's skim stock with hydrocarbon wax during manufacture. To prove that theory, plaintiffs relied mainly on experts Richard Grogan, Alan Milner, and Jon Crate.

Issue

Whether plaintiffs presented legally sufficient expert evidence to prove that the tire had a manufacturing defect when it left Cooper Tire's hands and that the defect caused the tread separation. Relatedly, whether the tire's failure itself, or experts' efforts to eliminate other possible causes, could support an inference of manufacturing defect here.

Rule

A manufacturing defect exists when a product deviates in construction or quality from the manufacturer's specifications or planned output in a manner that renders it unreasonably dangerous, and the plaintiff must prove the defect existed when the product left the manufacturer and was a producing cause of the injury. Expert testimony is admissible only if the expert is qualified and the opinion is relevant and reliable under Rule 702; if the testimony is unsupported by testing, scientific foundation, accepted methodology, or other reliable basis, it is legally no evidence. The mere fact of a product-related accident or malfunction does not generally permit an inference of defect, and proof by process of elimination is insufficient here where the product was not new and multiple other causes, including non-manufacturing causes, remained possible.

🔒

See the holding & full analysis

Create a free KwikCourt account to unlock the rest of this brief — and practice the case.

The court's holding and reasoning
Doctrine tests, pitfalls & exam hypotheticals
10 practice questions + 4 AI-graded essays on this case

Free sample · practice this case

Test yourself

One of 10 multiple-choice questions for this case. Pick an answer to see why.

In Phoenix, Nina Alvarez was injured when a four-year-old industrial hose burst during use at a landscaping site. She sues the hose manufacturer for manufacturing defect, relying on an engineer who says a trace oily residue inside the hose must have contaminated the bonding layer during production, but he performed no testing, cites no peer-reviewed support, and cannot identify any accepted methodology linking that residue to bond failure.

Is the expert testimony legally sufficient to support the manufacturing-defect claim?

Explanation. A plaintiff must prove a manufacturing defect existed when the product left the manufacturer and caused the injury. Where the alleged defect involves specialized technical matters, expert testimony must be qualified and reliable under Rule 702. An unsupported hypothesis connected to the facts only by the expert's say-so is legally no evidence. The majority rejected precisely that kind of untested, speculative defect theory. (Derived from Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. v. Mendez (n.d.).)