Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

493 So. 2d 98

493 So.2d 98

11 Fla.L.Weekly 1941

Docket No. 85-1790.

Coulson v. DeAngelo

James T. COULSON, Appellant, v. Anthony DeANGELO, et al., Appellees.

District Court of Appeal of Florida

Decided September 10, 1986.

District Court of Appeal of Florida · decided 1986-09-10

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“"[T]he complaint alleged that the manufacturer should be held strictly liable for engaging in an ultra hazardous activity.... [L]iability under the doctrine is generally imposed where a defendant engages in an activity which involves a risk of serious harm. The plaintiff did not allege that the act of manufacturing the gun was abnormally dangerous; instead he alleged that the use of the completed product by others was unusually dangerous. Thus, the trial court correctly dismissed this count of complaint."”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 778 So. 2d 1042 - Penelas v. Arms Technology, Inc.

“essence of the doctrine of strict liability for a defective condition is that the product reaches the consumer with something `wrong' with it.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 973 So. 2d 467 - LEGGETT GROUP, INC. v. Davis

Relies on Kelley v. R.G. Industries, Inc. · Trespalacios v. Valor Corp. of Florida

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1986-09-10

How this case has been cited

Cited by 8 later decisions — most recently October 2007

7 state decisions

40198619902000decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1*99 Peter Mineo, Jr. and Angelo Marino, Jr., Fort Lauderdale, for appellant.

¶2James B. Hamlin and Delissa A. Ridgway of Shaw, Pittman, Potts & Trowbridge, Washington, D.C., and Paul C. Huck of Fleming & Huck, Miami, for appellee Intern. Armament Corp.

¶3PER CURIAM.

¶4Affirmed. We reject the appellant's contention that the trial court erred in dismissing his claims against a gun manufacturer for failure to state a cause of action. Trespalacios v. Valor Corporation of Florida,486 So.2d 649 (Fla. 3d DCA 1986).

¶5The complaint alleged that the International Armament Corporation was strictly liable because a gun which it manufactured, and which was used to injure the plaintiff, could not be used for any legitimate purpose and was solely used for the commission of criminal acts. The plaintiff alleged that this made the gun a defective product and that the manufacturer should be held strictly liable. This concept has been consistently rejected. The essence of the doctrine of strict liability for a defective condition is that the product reaches the consumer with something "wrong" with it. In contrast the plaintiff alleged that it was the use of the gun that made it defective, not that it malfunctioned or had a faulty design.

¶6Additionally the complaint alleged that the manufacturer should be held strictly liable for engaging in an ultrahazardous activity. This doctrine has never been applied in Florida in circumstances such as these and liability under the doctrine is generally imposed where a defendant engages in an activity which necessarily involves a risk of serious harm. The plaintiff did not allege that the act of manufacturing the gun was abnormally dangerous; instead, he alleged that the use of the completed product by others was unusually dangerous. Thus, the trial court correctly dismissed this count of complaint.

¶7The only case to adopt a new theory of liability which holds a manufacturer of a "Saturday Night Special" strictly liable to innocent persons who are injured by the criminal use of a gun is Kelley v. R.G. Industries, Inc.,497 A.2d 1143 (Md. 1985). But even the Maryland court rejected the arguments that a manufacturer could be held strictly liable under traditional theories of liability.

¶8HERSEY, C.J. and ANSTEAD and DELL, JJ., concur.

/493/so2d/98 · .json · Public domain