## Facts

- K2 Corporation, a subsidiary of Anthony Industries, designed and sold the “Dan Donnelly XTC” snowboard without bindings and without pre-drilled binding holes.
- Customers attached bindings by driving coarse threaded screws directly into a fiberglass retention plate in the snowboard’s core.
- Gary Hyjek bought the snowboard and was injured when, according to his testimony, a binding came loose and the board struck his left ankle (March 24, 1991).
- In 1992, K2 began designing a different binding-retention system using through-core inserts with fine threaded screws.
- Hyjek sued for a design defect and sought to introduce evidence of K2’s later redesign to show the original design was unsafe and that a safer alternative was feasible.
- The trial court excluded the redesign evidence under Washington Evidence Rules 402, 403, and 407; the jury returned a special verdict for the manufacturer.

## Issues

1. Whether Washington Evidence Rule 407’s exclusion of subsequent remedial measures applies in strict product-liability design-defect actions, barring evidence of later design changes offered to prove defect or a feasible alternative design.

## Decision

- The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the judgment for the manufacturer.
- The court held ER 407 applies to strict product-liability claims, including design-defect claims.
- The court upheld exclusion of evidence of the post-injury redesign because it was offered to prove defect/culpability and no exception applied.

## Legal Principles

- Under ER 407, evidence of subsequent remedial measures is inadmissible when offered to prove negligence, culpable conduct, or (in Washington) a product defect in a strict product-liability design-defect case.
- The policy of encouraging safety improvements supports excluding post-incident redesign evidence in strict liability as well as negligence.
- Design-defect liability is assessed as of the time of manufacture; admitting later design changes risks jury confusion by shifting attention to post-manufacture improvements.
- ER 407 exceptions (e.g., impeachment, ownership/control, or feasibility if controverted) permit such evidence only for a genuinely independent, non-culpability purpose.

## Conclusion

Washington applies ER 407 to strict product-liability design-defect claims, so a manufacturer’s post-accident design change cannot be used to prove the earlier design was defective or that a safer alternative was feasible unless a recognized ER 407 exception is properly established.


Hyjek v. Anthony Indus., 944 P.2d 1036 (Wash. 1997)