High Court Rules Against Boating Industry in Propeller Case

WASHINGTON -- In a surprising, unanimous defeat for the boating industry, the Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that swimmers or boaters who are injured in propeller accidents can sue the engine makers for failing to install propeller guards.

The ruling clears the way for the husband of an Illinois woman who died in a boating accident to sue Mercury Marine, which makes motors for recreational boats. The company is a division of Brunswick Corp. of Lake Forest, Ill. The ruling also puts boat makers on notice that they should consider adding propeller guards.

In 1990, the Coast Guard studied the issue and decided against requiring propeller guards on recreational boats. Federal authorities said then that there was not a single design for a guard that would suit the hundreds of boat models.

Since then, the recreational boating industry has assumed that its manufacturers could not be held liable for failing to put guards on propellers.

At least 447 recreational boaters were injured or killed in propeller accidents between 1995 and 1998, federal officials said. A study by the Johns Hopkins University Injury Prevention Center said the “true number of propeller injuries and deaths” may be much higher, as many as 3,000 a year.

Until now, judges had consistently thrown out lawsuits charging the engine makers with selling a defective or dangerous product.

But the Supreme Court reversed course Tuesday and ruled that nothing in federal law shields engine makers from being sued in state courts.

Justice John Paul Stevens said the main purpose of the Federal Boat Safety Act “emphasized by its title [is] promoting boat safety.” It should not be used to shield manufacturers from being forced to take extra steps to save lives, he said.

“It is quite wrong to view ... the Coast Guard’s decision not to adopt a regulation requiring propeller guards on motor boats as the functional equivalent of a regulation prohibiting all states and their political subdivisions from adopting such a regulation,” he said in Sprietsma vs. Mercury Marine.

States, their courts and their juries remain free to hold engine makers liable for not adopting reasonable measures, he said.

The ruling revives a lawsuit filed by Rex Sprietsma for the death of his wife, Jeanne. On July 10, 1995, she was riding in an 18-foot ski boat on a lake in Kentucky when she fell overboard and was killed by the propeller.

His lawsuit contended Mercury Marine’s engine was unreasonably dangerous because it lacked a propeller guard. However, judges in Illinois tossed out his case.

“Now we get our day in court,” said Leslie Brueckner of the Trial Lawyers for Public Justice, who represented Sprietsma. “It’s a stunning affirmance of the tort system.”

It is rare, however, for the high court to side unanimously with trial lawyers and against manufacturers.

Two years ago, the court on a 5-4 vote blocked automakers from being sued for failing to install air bags on vehicles made before 1990. The justices also were closely split on whether federal law shielded medical device makers and cigarette companies from being sued in state courts.

Bush administration lawyers may have played a key role in tipping the case in favor of the plaintiffs. They filed a brief advising the court that federal transportation officials and the Coast Guard did not intend to prevent states from adopting more stringent standards of boat safety.