Summary
This Vermont Supreme Court opinion affirms a trial court's denial of a plaintiff's third motion to amend its complaint and its grant of summary judgment to a siding manufacturer on product-liability and implied-indemnity claims. The appellate court held that the trial court properly exercised its discretion to deny the amendment due to undue delay and prejudice to the defendant, as discovery was nearly complete and the new claims relied on theories already known to the plaintiff. Additionally, the court found that the economic-loss rule barred the tort claims because the damages constituted purely economic losses related to an integrated construction project, and neither the other-property nor special-relationship exceptions applied.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the trial court abused its discretion in denying Plaintiff's motion to amend the complaint for the third time.
- Whether the economic‑loss rule's other‑property or special‑relationship exceptions apply to Plaintiff's product‑liability claim.
- Whether Plaintiff has standing to appeal the summary‑judgment decision on Mountainview's implied‑indemnity claim.
Holdings
- The trial court did not abuse its discretion; the denial was proper because Plaintiff's amendment was untimely, caused undue delay, and would prejudice ATAS.
- The economic‑loss rule bars the product‑liability claim; neither the other‑property nor the special‑relationship exception applies.
- Plaintiff lacks standing; the appeal is dismissed and the trial court's summary‑judgment decision is affirmed.
Key quotations
“‘[t]he rule serves to maintain a distinction between contract and tort law’ because ‘[i]n tort law, duties are imposed by law to protect the public from harm, whereas in contract the parties self‑impose duties and protect themselves through bargaining.’”
Factual background
In 2016 PeakCM contracted to build a hotel in St. Albans, VT, hiring Mountainview to install metal siding panels manufactured by ATAS. Mountainview installed the panels without splice plates, relying on ATAS's website information. Panels later oil‑canned and fell, causing property damage. ATAS later released an information sheet (2006) recommending splice plates, but it was not publicly available at the time of installation.
Procedural history
Plaintiff sued Mountainview and later ATAS. The trial court denied a third amendment to the complaint and granted summary judgment to ATAS on both the product‑liability claim and Mountainview's implied‑indemnity claim. Plaintiff appealed.