Safety Must Trump Trade Secrecy

A state agency took an important first step last month toward protecting California consumers from dangerous products. Now a Sacramento lawmaker hopes to widen those safeguards to ensure that information about product hazards isn’t buried, opening the door to more injuries and deaths.

Corporations often insist that plaintiffs in damage suits agree, as the price of settling claims, to keep secret the records uncovered during litigation. The recall of 6.5 million Bridgestone/Firestone tires is the most recent example of this shameful practice. The recall came to light only after years of tire-related accidents--some of them fatal--because the scope of the problem was hidden from the public.

The tire company and Ford Motor Co., which used Bridgestone/Firestone tires, quietly settled many lawsuits without admitting liability. Those settlements required plaintiffs, in exchange for compensation, to keep secret all evidence of the tires’ tendency to shred under certain conditions.

Similar secret deals have meant that dangerous medications and medical devices stay on the market and that a host of environmental hazards persists. Corporations argue that sealing records preserves vital trade secrets. But consumer activists have long maintained that the trade secret argument more often simply shields dangerous products.

Last month, the California Judicial Council, the policymaking body for state courts, adopted new rules that will open up virtually all trial court records beginning Jan. 1. Only if a case passes a strict test can records can be sealed. “Unless confidentiality is required by law, trial court records are presumed to be open,” the new rules state.

Yet, while welcome, these rules don’t go nearly far enough. For example, key material may be beyond the scope of the new state rules because discovery documents detailing manufacturing or marketing practices or the terms of out-of-court settlements in injury cases are often not formally introduced into the trial record.

Next month, Assemblyman Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) plans to fill that gap by introducing a bill extending the Judicial Council’s rule to include all pertinent documents in a case, whether filed or not. Twice in recent years similar bills have failed. This time, Sacramento lawmakers should look to Florida and Texas, which have already taken a similar step, as models. The Judicial Council rules and the Bridgestone/Firestone tire tragedies should provide the momentum for action.