Seventh Circuit Finds Statute Of Repose Bars Products Action Involving Muzzleloader Rifle Purchased In 1994

As you know, we here at Abnormal Use love writing and blogging, so much so that our editor Jim Dedman is now contributing posts to other online venues.  Recently, his piece, “Seventh Circuit Finds Statute Of Repose Bars Products Action Involving Muzzleloader Rifle Purchased In 1994,” was published by DRI’s “Strictly Speaking” products liability newsletter.

Here’s the first two paragraphs:

Rejecting a Plaintiff’s negligence and strict liability claims in a case involving a muzzleloader rifle, the Seventh Circuit recently affirmed an Indiana federal district court’s grant of summary judgment on statute of repose grounds. Hartman v. EBSCO Indus., Inc., — F.3d —-, No. 13–3398, 2014 WL 3360799 (7th Cir. July 10, 2014). In so doing, the Seventh Circuit analyzed the two exceptions to Indiana’s ten year statute of repose and found that neither allowed the Plaintiff to bring claims involving a 2008 accident involving a LK–93 Wolverine muzzleloader first purchased in 1994.

For fourteen years, the Plaintiff had used his muzzleloader rifle (the somewhat complicated inner workings of which the Seventh Circuit explained in detail). In fact, he estimated he had fired it between 500 and 600 times prior to his November 2008 accident. His father had purchased and given to him the original rifle in 1994, but in 2008, the Plaintiff purchased a Knight 209 Primer Extreme Conversion Kit, an accessory designed to “deliver a hotter spark and thereby ignite Pyrodex pellets more reliably.” Plaintiff installed the kit himself.

To read the rest of the piece, please click here.