Motion in Limine - United States District Court

Case 1:06-cv-22644-ASG Document 364 Entered on FLSD Docket 07/23/2008 Page 36 of 45
at Ex. A & B). Defendant seeks to exclude these standards as irrelevant, not probative,
and highly prejudicial. As to ISO 3471, Defendant argues that the standard is irrelevant
because it does not apply to compact excavators. Specifically, the standard contains a
“Scope” section listing the types of machines it applies to, such as “backhole loaders”, and
does not mention compact excavators. As to the “Scope” of ISO 12117, the standard
states that “[i]t applies to compact excavators (as defined in ISO 6165) with swing type
boom, having an operating mass of 1000 kg to 6000 kg,” and Defendant argues that the
Bobcat 320 does not fall within this definition.
Defendant relies on two cases from other courts to support its argument that
standards that do not apply to the machine at issue are inadmissible as irrelevant. See
Ruffiner v. Material Serv. Corp., 506 N.E.2d 581 (Ill. 1987) (holding that standards plaintiff
sought to introduce were not relevant because, by their terms, they were applicable to fixed
ladders, and the case involved a special retractable, moving ladder); MacCuish v.
Volkswagenwerk A. G., 22 Mass. App. Ct. 380, 389 (Mass. App. Ct. 1986) (holding that
trial court erroneously admitted the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 217 because
it was a performance standard for buses, not vans; but the error was harmless).
In response, Plaintiffs argue that these standards were the only ones relevant to the
ROPS/TOPS structures promulgated at the time the Bobcat 320 was designed, and as
such, they are relevant. See Lollie v. Gen. Motors Corp., 407 So.2d 613 (Fla. 1st DCA
1981) (“At issue in this case was the manufacture and design of the automobile fuel tank.
The only minimum standard promulgated by the federal government regarding
performance of the fuel tank was FMVSS 301. Accordingly, the standard was relevant to
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