## Facts

- Carol (Gagné) Fusco was driving a Chevrolet Chevette in New Hampshire when the car abruptly left the roadway, slid down an icy embankment, and struck a telephone pole along the front-left area.
- Fusco claimed a steering component (the front-left ball stud) failed from metal fatigue before impact, causing loss of control.
- General Motors contended the ball stud fractured on impact and denied any design or manufacturing defect.
- At the second trial, Fusco presented expert testimony that the fracture surface indicated fatigue and that the ball stud’s design and quality control were inadequate.
- GM sought to introduce videotaped tests showing Chevette behavior when a ball stud was intentionally weakened or made to fail.
- A jury found for Fusco and awarded $1 million; the district court excluded certain GM videotapes and limited additional discovery efforts by GM.

## Issues

1. Whether the district court abused its discretion by excluding GM’s videotapes offered as demonstrative evidence concerning vehicle behavior after a simulated ball-stud failure.
2. Whether the district court abused its discretion by excluding a videotape not timely produced in discovery and by denying GM’s requests for additional discovery regarding plaintiff expert testing of the ball stud.

## Decision

- The First Circuit affirmed the judgment for Fusco.
- The court held the exclusion of GM’s videotapes fell within the district court’s discretion because the demonstrations risked being treated by the jury as reenactments without sufficiently similar conditions.
- The court held the district court acted within its discretion in excluding a late-produced videotape as a sanction for failure to timely supplement discovery.
- The court held the district court acted within its discretion in denying additional discovery requested close to trial, given fairness, burden, and delay concerns.
- Applying abuse-of-discretion review, the court found no showing of substantial prejudice warranting reversal.

## Legal Principles

- Demonstrative experiments, including videotaped tests that resemble accident reenactments, may be excluded unless conducted under conditions substantially similar to the event at issue when offered to prove what occurred.
- Even when labeled as illustrating “general principles,” demonstrative evidence may be excluded if its presentation is likely to mislead or confuse the jury about what would happen under actual accident conditions.
- Trial courts have broad discretion to manage discovery and to impose evidentiary sanctions, including exclusion, for failure to timely disclose or supplement discovery materials.
- Appellate review of evidentiary rulings and discovery management is for abuse of discretion; reversal generally requires a showing of meaningful prejudice or injustice.

## Conclusion

The First Circuit left intact a $1 million products-liability verdict, holding that the district court reasonably excluded test videotapes that could mislead the jury absent substantial similarity and reasonably enforced discovery obligations by excluding late-produced materials and limiting last-minute discovery.


Fusco v. Gen. Motors Corp., 11 F.3d 259 (1st Cir. 1993)