Defective Furniture Continues to Injure Children
What are my rights if my child is injured due to defective furniture?
Over summer, furniture maker Ikea recalled 29 million dressers after several deaths were linked to the items. Two children were killed when an Ikea chest fell on them in 2014, while another young child died in February of 2016. Ikea settled with the families of the deceased children for $50 million, but a recent viral video of yet another Ikea dresser toppling on a young child as his twin helps him to escape demonstrates the dangers of defective furniture continue to exist.
Types of Defective Furniture
In surveying the items in your home, your furniture may be one of the last things that you would consider capable of injury. However, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, an estimated 21,700 children under the age of 18 have been transported to the emergency room due to defective furniture related accidents between the years 2011 and 2013. Over a 13-year period, 360 young children died due to tip-overs, or furniture falling. The most common types of defective furniture include:
- Defective cribs
- Defective dressers
- Defective lamps
- Defective couches
- Unsecured televisions
- Defective TV consoles
Injuries associated with defective furniture include concussions, contusions, abrasions, fractures, and internal organ injuries. The most common victims of defective furniture are young children, but some furniture pieces hold the potential to harm adults as well.
Manufacturer Liability for Defective Furniture
If your child has been injured or killed by a furniture item, the manufacturer can be held accountable depending on the circumstances surrounding the accident. Furniture manufacturers have the duty to ensure their products are safe for their intended use. The makers of children’s furniture have a particularly difficult duty of ensuring their products cannot injure the young children that use them.
Our Georgia products liability lawyers assist the parents of children injured or killed due to defective furniture to recover the compensation they deserve. The makers of defective furniture may be held accountable for the damages they inflict, which could include medical expenses, emotional and mental pain and suffering, and much more. Act quickly as there are strict deadlines for filing a product liability lawsuit in the state.
Posted in: Product Liability