Defective Products

Fort Lauderdale Defective Product Attorneys

A defective product is defined as any product that causes injury or damage to a user as a result of a flaw in manufacturing, design, or labeling. If a manufacturer releases a product to the market that unreasonably injures a consumer, they are usually liable for the damages incurred by the user. Whether you have a defective product complaint about an unsafe and shoddily made item or you've suffered an injury from a poorly labeled dangerous product, the attorneys at Levine & Glassman can help get you the compensation you are entitled to receive.

Levine & Glassman, P.A. have extensive experience in defective product litigation in the following common areas:

• Prescription Drugs
• Automobile and Motorcycle Defects
• Tire Blowouts / Rollover Accidents
• Ladders and Industrial Tools
• Consumer Products
• Medical Devices
• Metal Baseball Bat Injuries

Read more about these areas to learn specific details concerning your defective product case in Florida, or contact us directly via phone, e-mail, or our online contact form to speak directly with an attorney and discuss your case.

Types of Liability

Legal action regarding defective products, also known as product liability, usually deals with different types of liability. The manufacturing company has a duty to provide a service to its customers without endangering their health or safety. That responsibility and liability is typically split into three separate components:

• Manufacturing Defects - A manufacturing defect encompasses shoddy craftsmanship, poor-quality materials, or other defects in the process of actually constructing the individual items themselves. A company trying to cut costs or take shortcuts will often produce these kinds of defects.
• Design Defects - These defects occur when a product's design is inherently dangerous or useless for its given purpose regardless of the care taken during the manufacturing process. These can usually be proven by establishing that the product fails to meet expectations of what a safe product should be, or if the risks associated with the product outweigh its supposed benefits. A chair designed with only three legs could be considered a design defect, since it would tip over too easily to be used reliably.
• Failure to Warn / Marketing Defects - A marketing defect occurs when a product has dangerous properties that may not be obvious to the user and whose effects could be mitigated by proper labeling and warning. Not all users of the product may be familiar with these dangers and should be properly informed of them to prevent injury. The infamous McDonald's coffee case is an example of a marketing defect; the customer, who was burned by spilled hot coffee, successfully sued McDonald's for not having a warning stating that the coffee was hot.

Usually, these types of liability are pleaded in terms of a number of liability theories that govern the ways in which the law deals with the negligent party. The liability of the manufacturer and sellers (including both wholesale and retail) will usually fall under one of these theories.

Product Liability Theories

A liability theory in this case is the way in which the defendant party's behavior is viewed regarding the product liability case in question. The main liability theories are as follows:

• Strict Liability - This liability theory came about as a result of the increasing difficulty to prove negligence in a product liability case during the middle of the last century. More and more plaintiffs with legitimate and serious injuries were losing cases because they couldn't prove negligence, so the courts came up with something to provide these seriously injured plaintiffs relief. Under strict liability, a manufacturer is liable for a defective product—even if they didn't perform any negligent acts—as a social responsibility to the market.
• Negligence - A negligence claim is often used along with strict liability and is usually primarily concerned with manufacturing or marketing defects. To make a successful negligence claim, the plaintiff must show proof that it was due to a breach of the company's duty to consumers that he or she was injured and that he or she suffered actual damages as a result. Like with a premises liability or general negligence case, the rule of comparative liability applies here; this means that a partially negligent plaintiff may not earn the full amount of damages.
• Breach of Warranty - A warranty is defined as a seller's direct statement regarding a product during a commercial transaction. Usually, this statement must be in direct conversation with the individual buyer, either written or verbal. These types of claims can deal either with express warranties—as in a vendor saying a tool is good for a specific use—or implied warranties— common expectations for a product regarding safety, merchantability, habitability, or fitness for use.
• Consumer Protection - This theory primarily serves to protect consumers from defective products which simply stop working, resulting in economic loss. normal product liability doesn't cover economic loss for products, so certain laws have been passed to prevent fraud and misrepresentation of a product's attributes. For example, lemon laws provide compensation for a defective automobile, even if said vehicle didn't cause any actual injury.

These theories will generally be used with one of the previously mentioned types of liability to establish a product liability case. For example, one may claim negligent defective manufacturing or strict liability for failure to warn the consumer.

Levine & Glassman, P.A. - Florida Product Liability Attorneys

If you've purchased a product and been subsequently injured as a result of a defect, you could be able to receive compensatory damages. Contact us today to speak directly with an attorney about your case in Fort Lauderdale, the surrounding areas of Broward, Palm Beach, and Miami-Dade counties, or throughout Southeast Florida. Call us at (954) 332-6100 or fill out our online contact form to set up a free initial consultation to discuss your case.

Contributor: Lisa Levine