Alabama farmer sues John Deere for ‘right to repair’
For industrial equipment (such as a tractor), who is liable for injuries if the equipment is repaired or modified by a 3rd party and it goes to court later?<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.biren.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;2020&#x2F;september&#x2F;defective-machinery-products-liability-litigatio&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.biren.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;2020&#x2F;september&#x2F;defective-machiner...</a><p>In particular <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.justia.com&#x2F;trials-litigation&#x2F;docs&#x2F;caci&#x2F;1200&#x2F;1245&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.justia.com&#x2F;trials-litigation&#x2F;docs&#x2F;caci&#x2F;1200&#x2F;1245...</a><p>&gt; The [misuse&#x2F; [or] modification] was so highly extraordinary that it was not reasonably foreseeable to [name of defendant], and therefore should be considered as the sole cause of [name of plaintiff]’s harm.<p>So, if it was foreseeable that a 3rd party may modify some equipment in some way, the manufacturer must specifically warn the purchaser about &quot;don&#x27;t do that.&quot;<p>With software, this becomes a much more difficult challenge.<p>Additionally, <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.justia.com&#x2F;trials-litigation&#x2F;docs&#x2F;caci&#x2F;1200&#x2F;1244&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.justia.com&#x2F;trials-litigation&#x2F;docs&#x2F;caci&#x2F;1200&#x2F;1244...</a><p>&gt; [Name of defendant] claims that [he&#x2F;she&#x2F;nonbinary pronoun&#x2F;it] is notresponsible for any harm to [name of plaintiff] based on a failure to warn because [name of plaintiff] is a sophisticated user of the [product]. To succeed on this defense, [name of defendant] must prove that, at the time of the injury, [name of plaintiff], because of [his&#x2F;her&#x2F;nonbinary pronoun]particular position, training, experience, knowledge, or skill, knew or should have known of the [product]’s risk, harm, or danger.<p>So with software, either the user is a sophisticated user and aware of the implications of installing their own patches on the system and what that could do (over fertilize a field because of an incorrect setting on the gps calibration)... or they aren&#x27;t.  If they <i>aren&#x27;t</i> a sophisticated user of the system, then it should be locked down sufficiently to prevent those changes.<p>&gt; “The sophisticated user defense concerns warnings. Sophisticated users ‘arecharged with knowing the particular product’s dangers.’ ‘The rationale supporting the defense is that “the failure to provide warnings about risks already known to a sophisticated purchaser usually is not a proximate cause of harm resulting from those risks suffered by the buyer’s employees or downstream purchasers.”<p>So are we expecting farmers to be software engineers too?