## Facts

- Ione Jenkins, age sixteen, was a front-seat passenger in a nearly new 1962 Chevrolet Corvair with about 2,200 miles.
- After leaving a drive-in theater near Swainsboro, Georgia, the Corvair traveled about 1,800 feet on a straight, level road and then suddenly veered left, became uncontrollable, struck a concrete culvert, and overturned.
- Jenkins suffered permanent paralysis.
- The investigating officer and other evidence indicated no excessive speed, alcohol use, or improper driving.
- Jenkins and the driver testified the car abruptly pulled left and could not be corrected despite steering inputs.
- Jenkins claimed GM negligently manufactured and inspected the left rear suspension by failing to properly tighten and inspect a nut/bolt assembly, causing the left rear wheel/suspension to loosen and a sudden loss of control.
- GM contended the left rear suspension condition was caused by the crash, not the cause of it, and offered evidence of factory quality-control procedures.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence of negligent manufacture and causation was sufficient to submit the case to the jury rather than grant a directed verdict or judgment notwithstanding the verdict.
2. Whether the trial court erred by excluding impeachment of a plaintiff’s expert with evidence that the expert had been indicted (without a conviction).
3. Whether the trial court erred in admitting certain testimony from Jenkins and, if so, whether GM preserved the issue by timely objection.

## Decision

- The Fifth Circuit affirmed the judgment on the jury verdict for Jenkins.
- The court held there was substantial evidence, including expert testimony and circumstantial proof excluding common alternative causes, to allow reasonable jurors to infer a manufacturing/inspection defect and causation.
- The court upheld exclusion of impeachment by indictment, treating an indictment as an accusation insufficient for credibility impeachment absent a conviction.
- The court held GM waived any complaint about Jenkins’s challenged testimony by failing to object contemporaneously; the trial judge’s handling and instructions also supported affirmance.

## Legal Principles

- A negligence products case may be submitted to the jury when the plaintiff presents substantial evidence, including expert testimony, supporting a specific defect and causation, even if the defendant presents conflicting expert testimony.
- When evidence supports competing inferences about whether a component condition existed pre-accident or resulted from impact, resolving that conflict is for the jury if a reasonable evidentiary basis exists for the plaintiff’s theory.
- Impeachment based on prior criminal matters generally requires a conviction; an indictment alone is ordinarily inadmissible as impeachment evidence.
- Failure to make a timely, specific objection to testimony at trial waives the claim of evidentiary error on appeal.

## Conclusion

The Fifth Circuit left the verdict intact because the record permitted a reasonable inference that a manufacturing or inspection defect in the left rear suspension caused the loss of control, the excluded impeachment evidence was based only on an indictment, and GM did not preserve its challenge to disputed testimony through timely objection.


Jenkins v. Gen. Motors Corp., 446 F.2d 377 (5th Cir. 1971)