Rita Thomas v. Publix Super Markets, Inc.

460 F. App'x 859

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
• Decided: March 8, 2012
• Docket: 11-13816
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

PER CURIAM:

This is a personal injury case. Plaintiff Rita Jones was injured on a Sunday afternoon, March 15, 2009, while in the produce department of a Publix supermarket. While she was reaching for an onion she encountered an unidentified odor which caused respiratory irritation; she fell to her knees coughing and vomited. After the parties joined issue and engaged in discovery, Publix moved the district court to exclude the opinion testimony of Jones’s expert witness under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 509 U.S. 579, 113 S.Ct. 2786, 125 L.Ed.2d 469 (1993), and for summary judgment. The court, in a comprehensive order dated July 21, 2011, granted both motions.

Jones appeals the summary judgment and the court’s order excluding her expert’s opinion testimony. We find no abuse of discretion in the district court’s exclusion of the expert’s testimony and therefore affirm its ruling. And we find no error in the the district court’s ruling that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur is inapplicable in this case and in its decision granting Publix summary judgment.

AFFIRMED.