Vossler

Defendant Richards Manufacturing Cornpany, Inc. (Richards) appeals from a judgment following jury trial in a products liability case. No attack is made on the sufficiency of evidence except as to the matter of punitive damages. The judgment was for compensatory damages of $25,000 and punitive damages of $500,000. We affirm.

Facts

We state the record in a light most favorable to the judgment. (Neal v. Farmers Ins. Exchange (1978) 21 Cal.3d 910, 922 [ 148 Cal.Rptr. 389 , 582 P.2d 980 ].)

In the period from 1970 through 1972, Dr. Leonard Marmor, an orthopedic surgeon working with the defendant corporation, developed a prosthetic device known as the Marmor Modular Knee, which permitted treatment of certain diseases of the knee by inserting specially crafted pieces of metal and plastic onto the surfaces of the bones that make up the knee joint. The metal components of the modular knee were originally produced in three sizes—small, medium and large—and each size included three elements (a template, a trial and a final component), each perfectly matched within a size for implantation. When implanting a metal component, the surgeon used the template to mark and prepare the…