Product designers and manufacturers owe every customer and user of their product a reasonable level of safety. When they fail, our Cleveland personal injury lawyers are ready to put in the work to hold them accountable.
Tittle & Perlmuter is a reliable, trusted, and proven law firm ready to help regular Ohioans when corporations put profits over people. We bring years of experience and fierce legal representation to your case.
Attorneys Allen Tittle and Scott Perlmuter love fighting for the underdog. We will help you take action to recover lost wages, pain and suffering, and medical costs. For a free consultation with strong product liability lawyers in Cleveland, OH, contact our law firm today.
Understanding Product Liability Claims in Cleveland, OH
Under Ohio Revised Code § 2307.71, product liability is a legal mechanism that holds commercial designers, manufacturers, and suppliers responsible for the injuries their hazardous goods cause other people. Victims of such injuries can seek compensation for their losses by proving the manufacturer, distributor, or other responsible party was negligent.
Consumers assume every product they purchase is safe, even expecting that most went through the FDA’s extensive approval process. Yet not all products that make it through are safe, and some companies skip those procedures altogether. This puts everyday users at risk for serious financial losses, physical limitations, and emotional turmoil due to their irresponsible actions. Our defective product lawyer in Cleveland works to lift the unfair financial burdens you face through legal action.
The Three Types of Defective Product Claims Recognized by Ohio Law
A defective product claim stems from one of three failures: manufacturer errors, designer errors, and failure to warn. Each of the three has specific requirements.
Manufacturer Responsibility
The manufacturing of the product made the product hazardous or harmful in some way. This may include the use of inferior materials or a lack of quality assurance. Companies have a responsibility to manufacture using safe materials and processes.Â
They also must ensure a product’s quality assurance process pinpoints potential defects that could alter the safety of the product’s use. Manufacturing defects are unplanned, often the result of improper assembly, poorly sourced materials, or mistakes by employees.
Designer Responsibility
The design of the product was inherently unsafe or defective in some way that should have been recognized prior to manufacturing and sale. A company must design a product with safety and function in mind. That often means the use of prototypes and testing to ensure those using the product will be safe when doing so. Designer oversights often stem from cost-cutting measures or a lack of testing.
Lack of Warning
The manufacturer or distributor failed to provide adequate warnings of known risks or clear instructions on how to use the product. Consumers suffer injuries because the packaging or instructions for the product do not warn them what not to do or fail to provide clear directions on safe use of the product. That means the consumer could not be aware of the risks of using the product or material.
Establishing liability requires pinpointing exactly where the breakdown occurred in the distribution chain. This enables our Cleveland product liability attorney to then seek legal action against those at fault. We gather the evidence necessary to determine who is responsible so we can build a claim that holds them accountable.
Common Examples of Dangerous Consumer Goods and Medical Devices
It is not always easy to know when a product will cause an injury or illness to someone. Consumers trust companies to do extensive testing before any product goes to market. However, there are many examples of defective equipment and products in cases we have handled:
- Defective medical hardware in metal hips
- Defective hernia mesh
- Food or baby formula toxicity
- Talcum powder disease-risks
- Transvaginal mesh errors and failures
- IVC filter failures and hazards
- E-cigarette failures to warn and hazards
- Defective power tools
- Unsafe vehicles or equipment
A comprehensive investigation into every injury, disease, or complication is necessary to determine where the failure occurred. It is very common for companies to take shortcuts, use inferior materials, or fail to provide quality assurance because it is expensive. They choose corporate profits over consumer safety.
The Strict Liability Framework in Ohio Product Claims
The Ohio Product Liability Act places strict standards on manufacturers, distributors, and others for keeping consumers safe. This law centers around the victim’s responsibility to prove a product was defective, the proximate cause, and the condition when it left the manufacturer’s control. This law applies strict liability, which means the injured party does not have to prove explicit negligence. Rather, victims need to show a defect existed and caused them harm.
The manufacturer’s degree of care is legally irrelevant when they put an unsafe product on the market. Under this law, you can seek a claim for losses if you can show you were using the product as the manufacturer intended, and it caused you harm.
Recoverable Damages in a Defective Product Lawsuit
Victims facing injury or illness resulting from a product defect can seek compensation for all losses they can show directly relate to the incident. This differs in every case but includes both economic damages and non-economic damages. The burden of proving both that these losses apply and their value is on the victim and their product liability attorney.
Economic damages typically have a clear value and loss and may include:
- All medical care for emergency needs
- Costs for follow-up support and corrective surgeries or treatment
- Lost earnings from being unable to work for a period of time
- Physical therapy and rehabilitative services
- Diminished earning power if long-term injuries exist limiting a person’s ability to go back to the same work
- Property damage related directly to the hazard
Non-economic damages are more subjective in value and may include:
- Physical pain from the incident and through recovery
- Emotional trauma sustained as a result of the events
- Disfigurement due to scarring, amputations, and burns
- Loss of quality of life
- Loss of consortium
These financial recoveries do not make the pain go away or erase what happened. However, the financial resources aim to restore stability in your life, especially after facing catastrophic bodily harm through no fault of your own.
The Action Window: Ohio’s Product Liability Statute of Limitations
Acting quickly is imperative to protect your right to fair compensation. Ohio’s product liability statute of limitations is typically two years from the date the injuries occurred. Failure to act within this timeframe means the court will not hear your case. That eliminates your ability to force the insurance company to pay for your losses.
More so, waiting becomes problematic. The sooner you reach out to our product liability lawyers, the faster we can act to:
- Gather evidence critical to your case from the at-fault party
- Preserve any remaining material from the accident safely
- Obtain witness statements from those involved
- Gather manufacturing logs that could show errors or intentional steps introducing harm
- Recall documents critical to proving designer or manufacturer failures
- Gather data to support chain-of-custody
Insurance companies act quickly to limit your control over these assets. Our Cleveland product liability attorney works quickly and diligently to protect them.
Contact Our Cleveland Product Liability Attorneys Near You
Tittle & Perlmuter is a proven law firm that fights for the little guy. Our attorneys know a single product failure can lead to life-threatening complications and long-term financial losses. When a corporation or manufacturer puts you at risk, let our Cleveland product liability lawyers help you. For a free consultation, contact our law firm today.
