Products Liability Law Reporter

Ann Marie Brown was stopped in traffic while driving a 2001 Honda Civic. Dominick Perez, a minor, was belted into a child restraint system in the back seat. Gregory Bruce Newman, who was driving a 2012 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited equipped with an aftermarket lift kit manufactured by Pro Comp USA, allegedly rear-ended Brown’s vehicle, pushing it into the vehicle in front of it. Perez suffered crush injuries resulting in paraplegia.

Brown and her husband, individually and as Perez’s guardians, sued Honda Motor Co., Honda of North America, Mfg., Inc., Honda North America, Inc., American Honda Motor Co., Pro Comp USA, and Newman. The plaintiffs asserted that the Honda defendants knew or should have known that the Civic was not sufficiently crashworthy in the event of a foreseeable bumper override collision and was therefore incompatible with higher vehicles. Additionally, the plaintiffs claimed, the lift kit was defective and unreasonably dangerous in that it tended to alter a vehicle’s center of gravity and made it foreseeable that the lifted vehicle would impact a passenger vehicle at a higher area than what is compatible. The plaintiffs also charged that Pro Comp’s manufacture of a 4.5-inch lift kit violated the state’s suspension lift requirements. Suit further alleged that all the defendants had violated the Enhancing Vehicle-to-Vehicle Crash Compatibility Agreement, which applies to all cars sold in the United States and is a voluntary measure to reduce fatalities in passenger car collisions involving vehicle height mismatches.

The parties settled for $45 million.

Citation: Brown v. Honda Motor Co., No. CV-20EV000858 (Ga. St. Ct. Fulton Cty. July 1, 2022).

Plaintiff counsel: Christopher D. Glover, Alyssa Baskam, James I. Seifter, and AAJ member Darren W. Penn, all of Atlanta.