Union Pump Co. v. Allbritton

898 S.W.2d 773, 1995 WL 277021
CourtTexas Supreme Court
DecidedJune 8, 1995
Docket94-0878
StatusPublished
Cited by419 cases

This text of 898 S.W.2d 773 (Union Pump Co. v. Allbritton) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Texas Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Union Pump Co. v. Allbritton, 898 S.W.2d 773, 1995 WL 277021 (Tex. 1995).

Opinions

OWEN, Justice.

The issue in this case is whether the condition, act, or omission of which a personal injury plaintiff complains was, as a matter of law, too remote to constitute legal causation. Plaintiff brought suit alleging negligence, gross negligence, and strict liability, and the trial court granted summary judgment for the defendant. The court of appeals reversed and remanded, holding that the plaintiff raised issues of fact concerning proximate and producing cause. 888 S.W.2d 833. Because we conclude that there was no legal causation as a matter of law, we reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and render judgment that plaintiff take nothing.

On the night of September 4, 1989, a fire occurred at Texaco Chemical Company’s facility in Port Arthur, Texas. A pump manufactured by Union Pump Company caught fire and ignited the surrounding area. This particular pump had caught on fire twice before. Sue Allbritton, a trainee employee of Texaco Chemical, had just finished her shift and was about to leave the plant when the fire erupted. She and her supervisor Felipe Subia, Jr., were directed to and did assist in abating the fire.

Approximately two hours later, the fire was extinguished. However, there appeared to be a problem with a nitrogen purge valve, and Subia was instructed to block in the valve. Viewing the facts in a light most favorable to Allbritton, there was some evidence that an emergency situation existed at that point in time. Allbritton asked if she could accompany Subia and was allowed to do so. To get to the nitrogen purge valve, Allbritton followed Subia over an above-ground pipe rack, which was approximately two and one-half feet high, rather than going around it. It is undisputed that this was not the safer route, but it was the shorter one. Upon reaching the valve, Subia and Allbrit-ton were notified that it was not necessary to block it off. Instead of returning by the route around the pipe rack, Subia chose to walk across it, and Allbritton followed. All-britton was injured when she hopped or slipped off the pipe rack. There is evidence that the pipe rack was wet because of the fire and that Allbritton and Subia were still wearing fireman’s hip boots and other firefighting gear when the injury occurred. Subia admitted that he chose to walk over the pipe rack rather than taking a safer alternative route because he had a “bad habit” of doing so.

Allbritton sued Union Pump, alleging negligence, gross negligence, and strict liability theories of recovery, and accordingly, that the defective pump was a proximate or producing cause of her injuries. But for the pump fire, she asserts, she would never have walked over the pipe rack, which was wet with water or firefighting foam.

Following discovery, Union Pump moved for summary judgment. To be entitled to summary judgment, the movant has the burden of establishing that there is no genuine issue of material fact and that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Nixon v. Mr. Property Management Co., 690 S.W.2d 546, 548 (Tex.1985). A defendant who moves for summary judgment must conclusively disprove one of the elements of each of the plaintiffs causes of action. Lear Siegler, Inc. v. Perez, 819 S.W.2d 470, 471 (Tex. 1991). All doubts must be resolved against [775]*775Union Pump and all evidence must be viewed in the light most favorable to Allbritton. Id. The question before this Court is whether Union Pump established as a matter of law that neither its conduct nor its product was a legal cause of Allbritton’s injuries. Stated another way, was Union Pump correct in contending that there was no causative link between the defective pump and Allbritton’s injuries as a matter of law?

Negligence requires a showing of proximate cause, while producing cause is the test in strict liability. General Motors Corp. v. Saenz, 873 S.W.2d 353, 357 (Tex.1993). Proximate and producing cause differ in that foreseeability is an element of proximate cause, but not of producing cause. Id. Proximate cause consists of both cause in fact and foreseeability. Travis v. City of Mesquite, 830 S.W.2d 94, 98 (Tex.1992); Missouri Pac. R.R. Co. v. American Statesman, 552 S.W.2d 99, 103 (Tex.1977); Nixon, 690 S.W.2d at 549. Cause in fact means that the defendant’s act or omission was a substantial factor in bringing about the injury which would not otherwise have occurred. Prudential Ins. Co. v. Jefferson Assocs., 896 S.W.2d 156 (Tex.1995); Nixon, 690 S.W.2d at 549; Havner v. E-Z Mart Stores, Inc., 825 S.W.2d 456, 458-59 (Tex.1992). A producing cause is “an efficient, exciting, or contributing cause, which in a natural sequence, produced injuries or damages complained of, if any.” Haynes & Boone v. Bowser Bouldin, Ltd., 896 S.W.2d 179 (Tex.1995); Rourke v. Garza, 530 S.W.2d 794, 801 (Tex.1975). Common to both proximate and producing cause is causation in fact, including the requirement that the defendant’s conduct or product be a substantial factor in bringing about the plaintiffs injuries. Prudential, 896 S.W.2d at 161; Lear Siegler, 819 S.W.2d at 472 n. 1 (quoting Restatement (Second) of ToRts § 431 cmt. e (1965)).

At some point in the causal chain, the defendant’s conduct or product may be too remotely connected with the plaintiffs injury to constitute legal causation. As this Court noted in City of Gladewater v. Pike, 727 S.W.2d 514, 518 (Tex.1987), defining the limits of legal causation “eventually mandates weighing of policy considerations.” See also Springall v. Fredericksburg Hospital and Clinic, 225 S.W.2d 232, 235 (Tex.Civ.App.— San Antonio 1949, no writ), in which the court of appeals observed:

[T]he law does not hold one legally responsible for the remote results of his wrongful acts and therefore a line must be drawn between immediate and remote causes. The doctrine of “proximate cause” is employed to determine and fix this line and “is the result of an effort by the courts to avoid, as far as possible the metaphysical and philosophical niceties in the age-old discussion of causation, and to lay down a rule of general application which will, as nearly as may be done by a general rule, apply a practical test, the test of common experience, to human conduct when determining legal rights and legal liability.”

Id. at 235 (quoting City of Dallas v. Maxwell, 248 S.W. 667, 670 (Tex.Comm’nApp.1923, holding approved)).

Drawing the line between where legal causation may exist and where, as a matter of law, it cannot, has generated a considerable body of law.1 Our Court has considered where the limits of legal causation should lie in the factually analogous case of Lear Sie-gler, Inc. v. Perez, supra. The threshold issue was whether causation was negated as a matter of law in an action where negligence and product liability theories were asserted. [776]

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898 S.W.2d 773, 1995 WL 277021, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/union-pump-co-v-allbritton-tex-1995.