What are Product Liability Cases?

Any product that fails can give rise to a product liability case.

If a nail gun misfires, if a ladder breaks under a 190 pound worker and it’s rated

for 250 pounds...

If a tire comes flying off your car while you’re driving, causing your car to fall, you could have

good grounds for a product liability case.

Let’s walk through that last example in more detail. Say your car came off on the highway,

putting you at great risk.

Our approach is to look at every aspect of the issue. Was the car serviced recently,

and if so what was done to it.

Had the tires been rotated? Where? Perhaps they could have put the lugnuts

back on improperly?

What if the lugnuts are sheared off and broken. A metallurgist hired by our firm may see that the

design was flawed, and the metal used was fatigued and broke apart when it shouldn’t have.

Or the manufacturer used an improper component that couldn’t be relied on to

withstand that particular purpose.

That’s a products case. The fault was with the company that made the device, not the

operator or people who serviced the device.

Here’s a case our firm had: A patient with a pacemaker needed to have it adjusted and

went under the knife. The surgeon couldn’t get the screw out that allowed adjustments.

Every time he tugged on it, it caused damage to the patient. The surgical team basically had to do open heart surgery to cut the

pacemaker out.

The question was, was that medical negligence, or did the

product itself fail?

The only way to find out was to get the medical records and try to do all

possible investigations.

The doctor said the screw was supposed to pop out when turned counterclockwise, and that he was doing it correctly with the tool provided by

the company, but it never popped out.

Fortunately, the surgical team held onto the pacemaker. It was given to an expert who

examined it and said the threading didn’t work correctly.

He was able to explain from an engineering standpoint why the

design was faulty.

That placed it as a product liability case, not a medical malpractice case.

In Massachusetts, workplace injuries are often ineligible for lawsuits, lawmakers having instead

decided to have workers receive workers compensation instead to pay the medical bills and the lost wages.

However, some workplace injuries may turn out to be product liability cases. Some heavy

machinery pieces have rear-facing cameras to prevent injuring people when backing up.

If that camera was to fail and a worker was injured as a result, that would be a product liability case.

Have you been injured? If so give us a call

Phone: 617-379-1797 Toll Free: 866-528-3515

www.coluccilaw.com