Brenda Sue Bradley v. Appalachian Power Company; Brady Napier v. Elk Grocery Company

Summary

The court replaced West Virginia's all-or-nothing contributory-negligence rule with a modified comparative-negligence rule. A plaintiff may recover if the plaintiff's negligence is less than the combined negligence of the other parties, but recovery is reduced by the plaintiff's percentage of fault and barred when the plaintiff's fault equals or exceeds the combined fault of the others. The court also prescribed procedures for allocating fault and held that the new rule applies fully retroactively to pending cases.