Williams v. Cingular Wireless

In Williams v. Cingular Wireless, 809 N.E.2d 473 (Ind. Ct. App. 2004) the plaintiff brought a negligence action against a cell phone company for furnishing to its customer the cell phone allegedly being used when the plaintiff's and customer's vehicles collided. Id. at 475. The trial court granted the cell phone company's motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim and the plaintiff appealed. Id. In Williams, the appellate court analyzed the relationship of the parties, the foreseeability of harm to the plaintiff, and public policy concerns to determine whether the cell phone company owed plaintiff any duty of care. Id. at 476. The Williams court found no relationship existed between the defendant and the plaintiff that would create a duty of care because the plaintiff had no contract with the defendant, was not a customer of the defendant, the accident did not involve the defendant's employee or automobile, and it did not occur on the defendant's property. Id. at 477. Further, the cell phone did not malfunction and cause the plaintiff's injury. Id. The Williams court also concluded it was not foreseeable that the sale of a cell phone would result in an automobile accident. The court stated: Although we agree that it may be foreseeable that a person who is using a cellular phone while driving might be in an accident, we do not agree with the leap in logic plaintiff urges us to make that it is likewise foreseeable to a legally significant extent that the sale of the phone would result in an accident. A cellular phone does not cause a driver to wreck a car. Rather, it is the driver's inattention while using the phone that may cause an accident. Drivers frequently use cellular phones without causing accidents, and, of course, cellular phones are used in all sorts of places other than in vehicles. We do not conclude that there was a high degree of foreseeability that the sale of the phone would result in an accident. Id. at 478 . The court in Williams also found public policy weighed in favor of not imposing a duty on a cellular phone company for automobile accidents. Id. at 478-79. "Simply because an action may have some degree of foreseeability does not make it sound public policy to impose a duty." Id. at 478. For example, It is foreseeable to some extent that there will be drivers who eat, apply make up, or look at a map while driving and that some of those drivers will be involved in car accidents because of the resulting distraction. However, it would be unreasonable to find it sound public policy to impose a duty on the restaurant or cosmetic manufacturer or map designer to prevent such accidents. Id. The court further stated in Williams: Cellular phones are safely used in many different contexts every day. Indeed, many drivers use cellular phones safely for personal and business calls, as well as to report traffic emergencies. Encouraging drivers to report accidents, dangerous road conditions, or other similar threats to authorities on their cellular phones is in the public's interest. Imposing a duty on Cingular and similar companies to prevent car accidents such as the one in this case would effectively require the companies to stop selling cellular phones entirely because the companies have no way of preventing customers from using the phones while driving. Doing so would place a higher burden on those companies than on other types of manufacturers or sellers of products that might be distracting to drivers. Ultimately, sound public policy dictates that the responsibility for negligent driving should fall on the driver. Id. at 479. After balancing these three factors, the court in Williams concluded that Cingular owed no duty of care to the plaintiff because the plaintiff's "attenuated relationship with Cingular and the foregoing public policy considerations substantially outweigh any foreseeability of the harm at issue." Id.