JOHNS v. SUZUKI MOTOR OF AMERICA, INC.

A man named Adrian Johns was seriously hurt when the front brake on his Suzuki motorcycle suddenly failed. He and his wife Gwen sued Suzuki, claiming the brake's design was defective (a strict products liability claim, which lets an injured person recover without proving the manufacturer was negligent) and also raising negligence claims. A jury awarded them millions of dollars but found Adrian was 49% at fault himself, so a trial judge cut the award under Georgia's apportionment statute, O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33. The Johnses argued that statute should not apply to their strict liability claim because older Georgia cases said a plaintiff's own fault could not reduce recovery in such cases. The Supreme Court of Georgia disagreed, holding that the 2005 apportionment statute's broad wording covers all injury claims, including strict products liability, and that it replaced the older case law. The court affirmed the reduced award and the denial of extra interest.

O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33(a) and (g), Georgia's fault-apportionment statute, applies to strict products liability claims because its plain language covers any action for injury to person or property without distinguishing among legal theories, and it supplanted older case law barring consideration of a plaintiff's fault in such claims.

The ruling means Georgia manufacturers sued for defective products can have damages reduced or barred by a jury's finding that the injured person was partly at fault, changing how much plaintiffs' lawyers can expect to recover and how defense lawyers litigate product liability cases statewide.

Affirmed

1. The court read the apportionment statute (O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33), which requires reducing a plaintiff's damages based on his percentage of fault, according to its plain text, which applies broadly to any 'action brought against one or more persons for injury to person or property' without singling out negligence claims.
2. Because the Johnses' claim was an action against Suzuki for injury to Adrian's person, the court concluded it fell within that broad statutory language even though it was a strict products liability claim rather than a negligence claim.
3. The court acknowledged older Georgia decisions holding that a plaintiff's own carelessness could not reduce recovery in strict products liability cases, but explained that those cases predated the 2005 version of the apportionment statute and that a clearly written statute can override earlier court-made rules.
4. The court rejected the Johnses' argument that 'fault' under the statute means the same thing as 'negligence' in the classic sense, explaining that fault is a broader concept that can be compared even against a manufacturer held strictly liable, so applying the statute does not contradict the purpose of strict liability law.
5. The court found unpersuasive a Court of Appeals case and related federal court rulings that had assumed the old no-apportionment rule survived, concluding those decisions never seriously analyzed the 2005 statute and disapproving the state case to the extent it suggested otherwise.

• motorcycle brake failure
• strict products liability
• comparative fault
• damages apportionment
• Suzuki lawsuit