Product Liability
We all tend to take products we use every day for granted. But your car, kitchen appliances and even a lamp or a child’s toy in your home can cause serious injuries if the product is defective or has a design flaw. A defective product injury can lead to a product liability case in Florida. “Product liability” refers to the liability of any and all parties along the product’s chain of manufacture for damage caused by that product. There may be multiple layers of liability and these types of claims may appear complicated. When a dangerous product causes a serious personal injury, the corporations that are liable and their insurance companies do everything within their power to avoid paying injury victims. At Matthew A. Karp, P.A., we know that’s wrong. That’s why we fight so hard for the rights of people seriously hurt by dangerous and defective products. There are many types of Products Liability cases such as the ones listed below and at Matthew A. Karp, P.A., we will fight to get you fully compensated for your injuries.
Design Defect: This type of claim occurs if the product featured a dangerous or risky design that ultimately caused your injuries. This includes situations where every product made poses the same risk, because there are inherently flaws with the object that make it unnecessarily risky.
Manufacturing Defect: Unlike design defects, these cases do not allege general problems with every version of a product. Instead, manufacturing defects arise when a single or group of those products was somehow built improperly, resulting in danger risks. If the product that caused your injury was defective due to a manufacturing flaw, the company may be held liable.
Hidden Defects/Defective Processes – Toxic Food: When people become sick from eating food processed at a plant that is dirty or has been contaminated, they can recover for their injuries.
Hidden Defects – Toxic Chemicals in Products: When a product contains toxic ingredients, injuries can arise years after the product has been purchased, installed or used. Materials such as lead in paint, asbestos in insulation, DDT sprayed on crops have all been the subject of litigation. If you have been poisoned or otherwise injured by toxic ingredients that are in a product, you can recover damages.
Hidden Defects – Dangerous Medications: Some medications have dangerous, but unknown side-effects that become known only after they are approved and in use. When an unknown side-effect causes severe injury, illness, birth defects or death, a person may recover for their injuries. The most famous case of this type was about the synthetic estrogen, DES, which caused numerous and severe birth defects in babies and increased cancer risks in mothers.
Marketing Defect: These defects refer to cases where a product where the labeling and/or warning included with the product was inadequate.