# Soule v. General Motors Corp.

> California Supreme Court · October 27, 1994 · 8 Cal. 4th 548

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9854961

## Case

- **Full name:** TERRI F. SOULE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, Defendant and Appellant
- **Court:** California Supreme Court
- **Decided:** October 27, 1994
- **Citations:** 8 Cal. 4th 548; 34 Cal. Rptr. 2d 607; 94 Daily Journal DAR 15133; 882 P.2d 298; 94 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 8207; 1994 Cal. LEXIS 6027
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Mosk
- **Judges:** Baxter, Mosk, Arabian
- **Cited by:** 810 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9854961

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- stating “we cannot accept GM’s insinuation that ordinary consumers lack any legitimate expectations about the minimum safety of the products they use. In particular circumstances, a product’s design may perform so unsafely that the defect is apparent to the common reason, expe…
- reasoning that, under California law, plaintiffs may recover if they establish a product either falls below consumer expectation as to safety or, if it meets ordinary consumer expectations, the fact-finder determines the product's design yields excessive preventable danger
- observing that “if the expectations of the product’s limited group of ordinary consumers are beyond the lay experience common to all jurors, expert testimony on the limited subject of what the product’s actual consumers do expect may be proper”

## Opinion text

MOSK, Acting C. J., Concurring.
.--I agree with the conclusion of the majority in this case, I cannot approve an opinion that purports to “take guidance” (maj. opn., ante, p. 576) from People v. Cahill (1993) 5 Cal.4th 478 [ 20 Cal.Rptr.2d 582 , 853 P.2d 1037 ].
Cahill , an opinion that deemed coerced confessions to be harmless, was and remains a cruel aberration in the law. It casts doubt on our devotion to justice and perpetuates a medieval concept that convictions can be obtained by any means and at any cost to integrity.
Unnecessarily citing Cahill for “guidance” reflects unfavorably on the otherwise satisfactory analysis of this opinion.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9854961. Public record. Not legal advice.