Charles E. Bowles, Jr. v. Zimmer Manufacturing Company, an Indiana Corporation

277 F.2d 868, 76 A.L.R. 2d 120, 1960 U.S. App. LEXIS 4654
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedMay 4, 1960
Docket12804
StatusPublished
Cited by27 cases

This text of 277 F.2d 868 (Charles E. Bowles, Jr. v. Zimmer Manufacturing Company, an Indiana Corporation) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Charles E. Bowles, Jr. v. Zimmer Manufacturing Company, an Indiana Corporation, 277 F.2d 868, 76 A.L.R. 2d 120, 1960 U.S. App. LEXIS 4654 (7th Cir. 1960).

Opinion

SCHNACKENBERG, Circuit Judge.

Zimmer Manufacturing Company, an Indiana corporation, defendant, has appealed from a district court judgment for $45,000 and costs, for plaintiff, Charles E. Bowles, Jr., rendered upon a verdict in an action brought to recover damages claimed in count I of an amended complaint to have been occasioned by the alleged negligence of defendant in the design and manufacture of an intramedullary pin, and claimed in count II thereof to have been occasioned by a breach of warranty in the sale of said pin.

Defendant’s responsive pleadings were answers, including a defense “that prior to the commencement of this action and on or about the 21st day of May, 1956, the Plaintiff was paid the sum of $9,600.-00 on account of his injuries and damage which said sum was accepted by and retained by the Plaintiff in satisfaction of the injuries suffered by him.” On motion of plaintiff, the latter defense was “dismissed”.

On a trial, the following material facts appeared:

On September 25, 1955, in Detroit, Michigan, plaintiff was struck by an automobile and thereby he fractured his left femur. While in the Receiving Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, for treatment, three days later, a 9 millimeter Kuntscher intramedullary pin was placed in the marrow cavity of the femur.

It was stipulated in the district court that G. A. Ingram Co. by written order to defendant, in Warsaw, Indiana, ordered the pin, which order was accepted by defendant in Warsaw, and that the pin was shipped by defendant to G. A. Ingram Co., who received it and thereupon delivered it to the Receiving Hospital. 1

Plaintiff was allowed up on crutches, instructed not to put weight on the leg and told how to exercise it, was released three weeks after his admission and then spent a week in bed at home. After making one call to the hospital as an outpatient, he was not examined or treated there afterward. He was examined by Dr. A. Jackson Day in Detroit on November 1, 1955. On December 12, 1955, X-rays were taken by Dr. Harry Harris at Dr. Day’s request. A minimum bend of less than 5 degrees at the fracture site was shown. Dr. Day advised plaintiff of this and plaintiff was as careful as he could be and continued to do his exercises and drive his car. In January 1956 he noticed further bending of the leg.

On February 3, 1956 plaintiff had pain in his leg and told Dr. Day that he slipped on the ice which compelled him to go forward on his hands with his injured leg held back up off the ground. There was then no more noticeable bending in the leg.

Plaintiff was admitted to a veterans’ hospital, where the pin was straightened and later a bone graft was performed, from a chip off his hip bone. He was on crutches, and then a cane.

He was admitted to Harper Hospital in Detroit on August 14, 1957 where by operation the Kuntscher pin was removed by Dr. J. G. Reid, an orthopedic specialist, and an 11 millimeter Schneid *871 er pin was inserted. He was discharged from that hospital on August 26, 1957.

On November 20, 1957, Dr. Reid found that plaintiff’s legs were the same length. There was some loss of internal rotation of the left leg. The next X-rays were taken August 21, 1958, at which time it appeared that he had a good solid bony union with a shortening of the left leg of less than % inch.

It was Dr. Reid’s opinion that delayed healing of the broken femur would result from a bend in such a pin, from any disturbance in proper apposition, and from the angle at the fracture site revealed by the X-ray of December 12,1955. The delayed condition of healing in August 1957 was also caused by the bending of the pin.

It was the opinion of Doctors Reid and Day that the fracture in plaintiff’s leg could reasonably have been expected to heal within six months’ time from the date of the original fracture. After the bending of the pin and the very little evidence of callus revealed by the X-ray of December 12, 1955, it was Dr. Day’s opinion that the union of the bone would take from nine to fifteen months.

Actually the pin continued to bend and union was not achieved until a new and different pin replaced the defective one in August 1957. It was Doctor Reid’s opinion that six months after November, 1958, plaintiff could perform all of his former duties. His incapacity from the date of the insertion of the first pin to May 1959 was, therefore, 3 years 8 months. This exceeds the normal 6 month period for healing of such a fracture by 38 months.

At the time of the accident, plaintiff (28 years old at the time of the trial in 1959), was employed as a grinder in a machine shop, earning about $2 an hour.

After the pin, which was manufactured by defendant, was removed from plaintiff’s leg, Dr. Reid sent it to Professor Herbert R. Lissner, at Wayne State University, Detroit. He testified that the pin in plaintiff’s leg was poorly designed and that, among the defects originating in the manufacturing process, was a crack running through the entire length of the pin. Any fluctuation of the leg would cause the crack to widen. That is what happened to the pin in plaintiff’s leg.

Plaintiff brought suit against the driver of the automobile that struck him and the case was settled in May 1956 by the payment of $9,600 to plaintiff. Plaintiff executed a release which contained the following specific reservations and rights:

“Anything to the contrary herein contained notwithstanding, Charles E. Bowles, Jr., reserves his rights against any and all persons, real and/or corporate who may have manufactured, sold, or used an intermedullary type nail inserted in the leg of Charles E. Bowles, Jr.”

At the close of plaintiff’s evidence, and again at the close of all the evidence, defendant moved the court to instruct the jury to return a verdict for defendant, upon the grounds, inter alia, now raised by defendant in this court. Those motions were denied.

1. At the trial defendant attempted to prove the facts set up in the dismissed defense in reference to the suit brought by plaintiff against the driver of the automobile and the payment of $9,600 to plaintiff. The court having sustained an objection thereto, an offer of proof was made by defendant and rejected.

Defendant contends that the court erred, asserting that it is a universal rule of law that where one suffers an injury as a result of an accident, which is subsequently aggravated, plaintiff is entitled to only one payment for all the injuries received, irrespective of the number of parties that may be liable for the original wrong or its aggravation. He quotes from Manthei v. Heimerdinger, et al., 332 Ill.App. 335, 75 N.E.2d 132, at page 140, where the court said:

“* -x- * The damages he sustained are inseparable and the overwhelming weight of authority appli *872 cable under these conditions is that the ancient rule of the release of one operates to release all applies indiscriminately, i. e., to both types of tort feasors, joint and independent concurring tort feasors.”

The court instructed the jury in the case at bar:

“12.

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277 F.2d 868, 76 A.L.R. 2d 120, 1960 U.S. App. LEXIS 4654, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/charles-e-bowles-jr-v-zimmer-manufacturing-company-an-indiana-ca7-1960.