Whitehead v. Toyota Motor Corp.
Tennessee Supreme Court
897 S.W.2d 684 (1995)
- Written by Nicholas Decoster, JD
Facts
In 1992, Mark Whitehead (plaintiff) drove his 1988 Toyota pickup truck across the centerline of a road and collided with a vehicle headed in the opposite direction. Whitehead brought a suit for strict products liability against Toyota Motor Corporation (Toyota) (defendant), the manufacturer of the truck, claiming that the injuries he received during the crash were enhanced due to the defective seatbelt design of the Toyota pickup. At trial, Toyota attempted to introduce comparative-fault principles to reduce any potential recovery by Whitehead. Tennessee courts had not ruled on whether comparative-fault principles were applicable to strict-products-liability cases, and the federal district court certified the following two questions to the Supreme Court of Tennessee: (1) whether comparative-fault principles were applicable to strict-products-liability cases, and (2) if so, whether comparative-fault principles also applied to enhanced-injury cases. The Supreme Court of Tennessee accepted these questions.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Drowota, J.)
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