Justia U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff, the personal representative of the estate of Velda Smith, sued defendants for medical malpractice, claiming that defendants negligently failed to transfer Smith to a medical facility where she could have received tissue plasminogen activator("tPA") to treat her stroke. At issue was whether the district court properly excluded evidence of plaintiff's medical expert's testimony and granted summary judgment in favor of defendants. The court affirmed summary judgment and held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding the expert's testimony pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 702 where the testimony was predicated on a methodologically flawed and unreliable published medical study ("Zivin Paper").

Appellees sued the Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis ("Archdiocese"), alleging that one of its priests sexually abused them when they were children and asserted Missouri common law claims against the Archdiocese for negligent hiring and for negligent retention and supervision. The Archdiocese moved for an interlocutory review of the district court's denial of its motion to dismiss under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) where the Archdiocese principally relied on Gibson v. Brewer, in which the Supreme Court of Missouri affirmed the dismissal of some materially indistinguishable claims. The court held that assuming the district court correctly held Gibson advanced a faulty First Amendment analysis, the district court erred in failing to predict the impact of the Missouri Constitution upon the negligence claims. Because the Supreme Court of Missouri in Gibson indicated the First Amendment was a complete defense to the negligence claims and reiterated the religious freedom provisions of the Missouri Constitution were broader than those of the First Amendment, it seemed highly likely that the Supreme Court of Missouri would bar the negligence claims under the Missouri Constitution, if its First Amendment analysis were later abrogated by the Supreme Court of the United States. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for dismissal of the negligence claims, as well as for further proceedings.

Appellant sued defendants, the City of Minneapolis ("city") and an off-duty city police officer, alleging excessive force claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983 and assault and batter claims under Minnesota Law. At issue was whether the district court properly granted the city's motion for summary judgment with respect to the vicarious liability claims against the city. The court held that the district court properly granted summary judgment where appellant failed to show that the officer's assault occurred within work-related limits of time and place.

Plaintiff filed a petition for equitable garnishment against State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company ("State Farm") after she was injured at a crosswalk from a truck driver, the insured under State Farm's policies, who negligently struck and injured her. At issue was whether plaintiff could recover additional amounts from State Farm where State Farm's policy contained an "anti-stacking" clause and an "excess coverage" clause. The court reversed the district court's ruling that plaintiff could stack State Farm's liability limits in each of its four policies where Paragraph 3 of the policy did not create an ambiguity that permitted a court to ignore the unambiguous anti-stacking clause in Paragraph I. The court also remanded to the district court to decide whether a single insurer, having issued four policies to the owner of four vehicles who then negligently caused an accident while driving a non-owned vehicle, may enforce its anti-stacking clause after it satisfied the minimum Missouri's Motor Vehicle Financial Responsibility Law's, State. 303.010 et seq., coverage requirement.

Plaintiff sued the City of Little Rock under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"), 42 U.S.C. 12133, and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 ("Rehabilitation Act"), 29 U.S.C. 794a(a)(2), when she was injured at the Little Rock Zoo where her rental scooter tipped over on an incline. At issue was whether plaintiffs may recover compensatory damages under the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act without showing a "heightened standard" of intentional discrimination. Also at issue was whether the rental fee charged by the zoo for the scooter was an impermissible surcharge under applicable ADA regulations. Further at issue was whether the district court erred in concluding that plaintiff lacked standing to challenge the zoo's liability waiver imposed after her accident. The court affirmed the judgment and held that plaintiff was not entitled to recover compensatory damages where she failed to show intentional discrimination through proof of deliberate indifference or otherwise. The court also held that the surcharge was not illegal where the zoo was not "required" to provide scooters to disabled visitors. The court further held that plaintiff lacked standing to challenge the waiver of tort liability the zoo enacted after her injury where she failed to show an adequate injury in fact.

Appellant brought a products liability lawsuit against appellee after appellant's left arm was amputated below his elbow as the result of a farming accident on a 1998 New Holland Model 648 hay baler. A jury found in favor of appellee and appellant appealed challenging six of the district court's evidentiary rulings. The court affirmed the judgment and held that the district court did not abuse it's discretion by admitting two jury verdicts favorable to appellee in other cases involving accidents substantially similar to appellant's where appellant's opening statements and theme increased the probative value of the verdicts; by excluding other accidents involving appellee's hay balers where admitting similar-incident evidence threatened to raise extraneous controversial issues, confuse the issues, be more prejudicial than probative, and create a trial within a trial for each previous incident; by excluding expert testimony of the pinch point and the baler tire where the evidence was minimally probative, cumulative, and would have unnecessarily confused the issue; and by admitting the total number of Series 6 balers manufactured where admitting the total number provided context for the jury to consider the substantially similar incidents. The court also held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by excluding photographs and exhibits that had limited probative value and would unduly confuse the jury. The court further held that the district court did not err in excluding expert witness testimony regarding the Engineering Code of Ethics where such testimony was irrelevant because there was no legal force or effect to those rules and no foundation.

Plaintiffs sued DAP, Inc. ("DAP") on behalf of herself and the decedent's minor children when decedent suffered second and third-degree burns on 80% of his body and ultimately died from an accident that occurred when he dropped a can of DAP Weldwood Gel Formula Contact Cement ("DAP cement") on the floor of his home and attempted to clean the spill which caused the DAP cement to ignite and caused a flash fire. At issue was whether the label on the DAP cement complied with the Federal Hazardous Substances Act ("FHSA"), 15 U.S.C. 1261, for failure to warn and whether the DAP cement label failed to exhibit adequate precautionary measures describing the action to be followed or avoided under section 1261(p)(1)(F). The court affirmed summary judgment and held that the risk of fire from an accident spill of DAP cement was not a principal hazard that the FHSA required the label to affirmatively make. The court also held that the FHSA did not require the DAP cement label to warn consumers against spreading the product after a spill as a precautionary measure.