William Hunt, Jr. sued Medtronic USA, Inc. after a spinal cord stimulator implanted in his body to treat chronic back pain malfunctioned in March 2021. Hunt sought damages under the Washington Consumer Protection Act and for negligence. He alleged that Medtronic misrepresented that he would receive a smart tablet programmer to control the device and failed to properly service the device, causing nerve damage and pain. The district court granted Medtronic's motion for summary judgment on both claims. The court dismissed the consumer protection claim because Hunt offered no evidence that the alleged misrepresentation had a public impact beyond his individual case. The court dismissed the negligence claim because Hunt failed to present expert evidence establishing that Medtronic's actions breached a duty or caused his injuries. Hunt appealed the decision to the Ninth Circuit.
The Ninth Circuit reviewed the summary judgment de novo. First, the court addressed Medtronic's argument that Hunt's brief should be dismissed for failing to include record citations. The court declined to strike the brief, noting that Hunt's opening brief contained numerous citations in the statement of facts and footnotes, allowing the court to find the information Hunt argued supported his claims. Second, regarding the Washington Consumer Protection Act claim, the court explained that to prevail, a plaintiff must show the misrepresentation injured others, had the capacity to injure others, or had the capacity to injure other persons. The court cited Washington precedent stating that additional plaintiffs must be shown to have been or will be injured in the exact same fashion to change a factual pattern from a private dispute to one affecting the public interest. Hunt offered no evidence that Medtronic promised other patients a tablet programmer. Furthermore, Medtronic presented unrebutted evidence that FDA restrictions prevent patients from owning the tablet programmers. Hunt also failed to prove that his experience was part of a systemic script rather than an isolated incident. Third, regarding the negligence claim, the court applied the rule that expert testimony is required when an essential element is beyond the expertise of a layperson. To succeed, a plaintiff must prove duty, breach, injury, and proximate cause. Hunt's disclosed experts explicitly stated they had no opinion on Medtronic's actions or inactions and did not attribute Hunt's injuries to the device. One expert even attributed Hunt's pain to a car accident in 2019. Consequently, Hunt lacked the necessary expert testimony to establish breach of duty and causation.
The decision affirms the dismissal of Hunt's claims, leaving him without a remedy for the device malfunction. It reinforces the strict evidentiary requirements for Washington Consumer Protection Act claims, specifically the need to demonstrate public impact rather than isolated harm. Additionally, it clarifies that in complex medical device cases, plaintiffs cannot rely on lay testimony to prove breach of duty or causation; they must secure expert opinions linking the device's performance to the specific injury. The case remains unpublished and serves as precedent only under Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
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