ONTARIO SEWING MACHINE COMPANY, LTD. v. Smith

Sears, Presiding Justice.

We granted certiorari in this case to consider whether the opinion of the Court of Appeals constitutes an erroneous expansion of the law of this state regarding the existence and scope of the duties of manufacturers with respect to dangerous product defects. For the reasons that follow, we conclude that the Court of Appeals decided issues concerning the duties of manufacturers that were unnecessary to a resolution of the issue of proximate cause, which was the sole issue on which the trial court granted summary judgment to the manufacturers and thus was the decisive…