## Facts

- Karen Leslie Vivienne Norman drove a 1991 Honda Civic in Galveston, Texas.
- Around 2:00 a.m., she accidentally backed the Civic down a boat ramp into Galveston Bay.
- The Civic was equipped with a passive restraint system that used an automatic shoulder belt moved by a “mouse” mechanism along a track above the door, plus a separate manual lap belt.
- The shoulder belt could be disengaged using an emergency release button located behind the driver’s left shoulder.
- Josel Woods, the passenger, was not wearing a seat belt and escaped through the passenger-side window.
- Woods testified that after she exited and began swimming toward the ramp, she heard Karen call for help and say she could not get her seat belt undone.
- A dive team located the vehicle later that morning; the car was found submerged, with the windows rolled up and the doors closed.
- Karen was found dead inside the vehicle; an autopsy reported a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.17.
- Brian Norman (individually and as administrator of Karen’s estate) and Mary Norman brought a strict products-liability design-defect claim against Honda of America Manufacturing, Inc. and Honda R & D Co., Ltd.
- Plaintiffs alleged the automatic shoulder-belt system and the placement of the emergency release trapped Karen, preventing escape as the car sank.
- At trial, plaintiffs proposed several alternative seatbelt designs and presented evidence that at least one other manufacturer used one of the proposed alternatives.
- The jury found for the Normans and awarded substantial damages (reported as $65 million in compensatory damages).
- Honda appealed, challenging (among other things) the sufficiency of the evidence on producing cause and on the existence of a safer alternative design.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to show that a design defect in the Civic’s automatic shoulder-belt system was a producing cause of Karen Norman’s death.
2. Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to establish a safer alternative design that was available when the vehicle left Honda’s control and that would have prevented or significantly reduced the risk of the injury without materially reducing the product’s utility.
3. If the evidence was legally insufficient on producing cause or safer alternative design, whether the proper disposition was reversal and rendition of a take-nothing judgment.

## Decision

- The court of appeals reversed the trial court’s judgment and rendered a take-nothing judgment for Honda.
- The court held the evidence was legally insufficient to support the jury’s finding of producing cause tying a design defect in the seatbelt system to Karen Norman’s death.
- The court also held the evidence was legally insufficient to establish a safer alternative design meeting Texas design-defect requirements.
- Because the dispositive proof was legally insufficient, the court did not need to decide all remaining appellate complaints to grant Honda full relief.

## Legal Principles

- In a Texas strict-liability design-defect claim, the plaintiff must prove a design defect and that the defect was a producing cause of the injury.
- Texas law requires proof of a safer alternative design for a design-defect theory; the alternative must be:
  - technologically and economically feasible when the product left the manufacturer’s control, and
  - capable of preventing or significantly reducing the risk of injury without substantially impairing the product’s utility (and without creating equal or greater risks in other situations).
- A verdict cannot stand where the evidence amounts to speculation on essential elements such as causation or safer alternative design.
- When an appellate court finds legally insufficient evidence on an essential element, the proper remedy is reversal and rendition of judgment for the defendant (a take-nothing judgment).

## Conclusion

Honda of America Mfg., Inc. v. Norman reversed a large jury verdict arising from a drowning in a submerged 1991 Honda Civic, holding the plaintiffs failed to present legally sufficient evidence that the automatic shoulder-belt design was a producing cause of death and failed to prove a qualifying safer alternative design under Texas design-defect law; the court therefore rendered a take-nothing judgment for Honda.


Honda of America Mfg., Inc. v. Norman, 104 S.W.3d 600 (2003)