Evans v. Lorillard Tobacco Co.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts · Torts

TortsProducts liabilityWrongful deathDesign defectFailure to warnNegligencePunitive damagesConsumer protection

Facts

Marie Evans began smoking Newport cigarettes at age thirteen in 1960 after receiving free cigarette samples in her neighborhood and continued smoking heavily for decades; at least ninety percent of the cigarettes she smoked were Newports. She became addicted to nicotine, repeatedly failed to quit, and died in 2002 from small cell lung cancer caused by smoking. The plaintiff presented evidence that tar causes cancer, nicotine causes powerful addiction, menthol makes cigarettes easier for some young people to start smoking, and cigarettes could have been designed with lower tar and nonaddictive nicotine levels. The plaintiff also presented evidence that before 1970 Lorillard gave no warnings beyond those required by federal law and publicly cast doubt on whether smoking caused cancer or addiction.

Issue

Whether the evidence and instructions were sufficient to sustain wrongful-death liability against Lorillard for breach of the implied warranty of merchantability and negligence, whether Lorillard assumed a legal duty through its 1954 public statement, and whether the damages and c. 93A judgment could stand. The court also addressed whether the claims were time-barred.

Rule

In Massachusetts, design-defect liability under the implied warranty of merchantability is governed by a risk-utility balancing standard in which consumer expectations are a factor, not a mandatory or determinative element. A plaintiff must prove a technologically feasible and practical reasonable alternative design that would reduce the risk without undue cost or undue interference with product performance; for cigarettes, that inquiry is assessed from the perspective of a rational, informed consumer whose choice is not substantially impaired by addiction. A seller also has no duty to warn of risks that are obvious or generally known, but a warning defect remains actionable where the specific risks were not obvious to users and an adequate warning could have prevented the plaintiff from becoming addicted before warnings were given. A broad public pledge in advertising does not, without more, create an enforceable voluntarily assumed legal duty to research and disclose health information indefinitely to the public at large.

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

In Boston, Nina Ortega sues Harbor Leaf Products after developing a disease allegedly caused by the company’s smokable herbal sticks. She offers expert testimony that the product could have been made with a feasible lower-toxin design at similar cost, but she offers no separate evidence that ordinary consumers expected the product to be safer than it was.

Under Massachusetts design-defect law as described by the majority opinion, which is the strongest argument for Nina?

Explanation. The majority reaffirmed Massachusetts’s risk-utility approach for design defect. Consumer expectations may be considered, but they are not a required or determinative element. A plaintiff need not always prove that the product was more dangerous than consumers expected if other evidence establishes a feasible reasonable alternative design and unreasonable risk.