Cupola case

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The cupola case is a dated VI. Civil Senate of the Federal Court of Justice on September 18, 1984 decided case on extended producer liability . The peculiarity of the case is that the BGH awarded the injured party a claim for damages by analogously applying the rules of reversing the burden of proof that were developed for an immission law regulation.

facts

The debtor operated an approved hot blast cupola smelting facility with emissions levels within the reference range. Nevertheless, the car of the external creditor on a neighboring property of the plant operator was damaged to paint, glass and chrome parts. The injured party attributed this to the proportion of iron oxide in the exhaust gases from the cupola furnace, which is why he demanded compensation on the grounds that the permissible emission values ​​had been exceeded on that day as a result of incorrect operation and maintenance.

judgment

The BGH initially denied the direct applicability of the immission law claim bases according to §§ 906 paragraph 2 sentence 2 BGB and § 14 sentence 2 BImSchG , since the claimant was not - as required by these standards - owner or owner of the parking lot on which he was driving his car had parked.

The only possible basis for a claim was Section 823 (1) BGB. According to the general rules on the burden of proof, the injured party would have had to prove the unlawfulness and fault of the plant operator in the sense of this provision in addition to the fact of the damage . However, the BGH relied on the developed case law on producer liability and applied a reversal of the burden of proof in accordance with Section 906 (2) BGB . The BGH did not have to comment on the question of the liability-establishing causality , as this had been subordinated by the appeals court. The BGH now argued that the person injured by immissions , just like the injured consumer, has no insight into the circumstances causing the damage, on the other hand, the issuer is subject to traffic safety obligations to control his emission values.

After these findings, the BGH referred the matter back to the Zweibrücken Higher Regional Court for judgment , which then came to the conclusion that in the specific case the defendant plant operator had provided the evidence incumbent on him that he had taken all reasonable precautions to avoid harming the plaintiff. In the absence of a violation of the traffic safety obligations, the action was ultimately dismissed.

See also

Case law on producer liability:

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ BGHZ 92, 143. (BGH, September 18, 1984 - VI ZR 223/82) = JZ 1984, 1106 (note Gottfried Baumgärtel ) = NJW 1985, 47 = JuS 1985, 312 (note Volker Emmerich ).
  2. ^ A b Dieter Medicus : Civil law . 19th edition Carl Heymanns Verlag, Cologne 2002, ISBN 3-452-24982-4 , § 25 II.
  3. ↑ Cf. in this respect the tightening of liability by BGHZ 67, 359 ( float switch case) on further eating damage; BGHZ 86, 256 (question of equality of material); BGHZ 80, 186 ff (199) (product monitoring obligations); Jens Petersen : Facilitation of evidence for health impairments through emissions and neighborly tolerance obligation , NJW 1998, 2099 to BGH NJW 1997, 2748.
  4. ↑ The LMU presents: The cupola case: Between the burden of proof and the right to information