Kerin v. Titeflex Corporation

Filing 30

Judge Michael A. Ponsor: MEMORANDUM AND ORDER entered. As follows: For the reasons stated in the attached memo and order, Defendants Motion to Dismiss (Dkt. No. 18 ) is hereby ALLOWED. The clerk will enter judgment for Defendant. This case may now be closed. It is So Ordered. See the attached memo and order for complete details. (Lindsay, Maurice)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
TIM KERIN,
Plaintiff

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v.
TITEFLEX CORPORATION
t/a GASTITE,
Defendant

C.A. No. 13-cv-30141-MAP

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER REGARDING
DEFENDANT’S MOTION TO DISMISS
(Dkt. No. 18)
January 7, 2014
PONSOR, U.S.D.J.
Plaintiff owns a home in New Smyrna Beach, Florida,
that uses Defendant’s product, Gastite, to provide natural
gas for use in an outdoor firepit.

Gastite is made of

corrugated stainless steel tubing (“CSST”), which Plaintiff
alleges is vulnerable to puncture in the event of a nearby
lightning strike.

This potential vulnerability forms the

basis of Plaintiff’s four causes of action, alleging strict
liability for design and manufacturing defects, negligence
in design and failing to test the product, negligence in
failure to warn, and strict liability in failure to warn.
Plaintiff concedes that the CSST used at his home has
never caused him any problem.

He concedes that CSST

generally, and Gastite specifically, is used widely and is

approved by both governmental agencies and regulatory
entities.

He alleges that occasions have occurred, though

they are rare, where the CSST in other people’s homes may
have been “involved” in a fire following a lightning strike.
The essence of Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss is that
Plaintiff lacks standing under Article III of the
Constitution to bring this lawsuit.

In order to demonstrate

standing, Plaintiff must establish (1) that he suffered an
“injury in fact,” (2) that there is a causal connection
between the alleged injury and Defendant’s alleged conduct,
and (3) that the injury will likely be redressed by the
requested relief.

Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S.

555, 560 (1992).
Here, it is obvious that Plaintiff cannot clear the
“injury in fact” hurdle.

A cognizable injury for Article

III standing purposes must be “concrete and particularized,”
as well as “actual or immanent, not conjectural or
speculative.”

Id.

“A threatened future injury must be

‘certainly impending’ to grant Article III standing.”

In re

Fruit Juice Prods. Mktg. & Sales Practices Litig., 831 F.
Supp. 2d 507, 510 (D. Mass. 2011).
In this case, the strand of conjecture needed to
support Plaintiff’s causes of action is simply too
attenuated.

First, a nearby lightning strike is required.
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Second, the lighting strike must have the effect of causing
a puncture in the CSST, with some resulting injury caused by
a defect in the CSST.

The Supreme Court has “repeatedly

reiterated that ‘threatened injury must be certainly
impending to constitute injury in fact’ and that
‘[a]llegations of possible future injury’ are not
sufficient.”

Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l., USA, 133 S. Ct.

1138, 1147 (2013) (emphasis in original).
The capriciousness of a lightning strike is the stuff
of folklore.

The possibility of some negative consequences

arising from this genus of caprice is so speculative that it
simply cannot provide a foundation for a claim in federal
court that satisfies the requirements for Article III
standing.
Even were the court to find that Plaintiff’s claims
satisfied the fundamental requirements for Article III
standing in federal court, his complaint nonetheless fails
to state any valid claim under Massachusetts law.

Taking as

true Plaintiff’s factual allegations, though not his
threadbare legal conclusions, Air Sunshine, Inc. v. Carl,
663 F.3d 27, 33 (1st Cir. 2011), a further fatal defect in
Plaintiff’s claim is the utter absence of any allegation of
an applicable standard against which Plaintiff’s due care
could be measured.

The Supreme Judicial Court has
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recognized claims for economic injury stemming from a
defective product, but only where “the standard that a
product allegedly fails to meet is ... one legally required
by and enforced by the government.”
Motor Co., 451 Mass. 623, 633 (2008).

Iannacchino v. Ford
Plaintiff concedes

that the CSST in question does not violate any applicable
regulatory standard.
For the foregoing reasons, Defendant’s Motion to
Dismiss (Dkt. No. 18) is hereby ALLOWED.
enter judgment for Defendant.

The clerk will

This case may now be closed.

It is So Ordered.
/s/ Michael A. Ponsor
MICHAEL A. PONSOR
U. S. District Judge

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