THOUSAND OAKS : Order in Baby’s Death Overturned

A state appeal court Wednesday overturned a Ventura County judge’s order that required a mother whose 5-week-old infant was killed in a Thousand Oaks auto wreck to demonstrate how the baby was put into a car seat.

Lori Stermer, daughter of Margery and William Stermer of Oxnard, died from injuries suffered in the May 4, 1990, crash. The accident occurred when the car carrying the infant was broadsided on Lynn Road near the Ventura Freeway in Thousand Oaks.

The Stermers filed a lawsuit in Superior Court against Dayton Hudson Corp. and Kolcraft Enterprises Inc.

Dayton Hudson sold the car seat in which Lori was riding and Kolcraft manufactured the seat.

During a deposition, attorneys for the defendants provided Margery Stermer with a plastic doll and asked the mother to demonstrate how Lori was placed and secured into the car seat.

Stermer’s attorney objected on the grounds the demonstration was not authorized under law and that the demonstration would be misleading because the doll did not approximate the physical characteristics of the deceased infant, according to court records.

Superior Court Judge Edwin M. Osborne, however, ordered Stermer to perform the re-enactment, records say.

Saying the question of such re-enactments at depositions “has been the subject of considerable interest” in California, the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Ventura ruled that a Superior Court judge has authority only to order plaintiffs to answer any questions during depositions--not to make demonstrations.

The Superior Court “abused its discretion when it ordered Ms. Stermer to perform a re-enactment,” the court wrote in a unanimous opinion by Justice Steven J. Stone.