Category: Product Liability Attorney

If you are not careful, overzealous exercise regimes can cause injuries. You can overextend yourself or sprain a limb using gym equipment your body is not fit to tackle. These issues are common and your responsibility. However, if you are injured in a fitness center because of an owner’s negligence, you have every right to file for damages, according to the Illinois Premise Liability Act.

As per the law, the owners of a property that is used for commercial purposes must ensure all reasonable safety measures are in place to protect their clients. For gym owners, this means they have to make sure customers are not in danger when they are working out on the premises.

Some of the situations that can put you in unnecessary danger in a gym include the following:

• You do not get medical attention following an injury

  – If you are injured during a workout, an employee of the gym should immediately treat you with basic first aid equipment and in a competent manner. Failure to do so can put the owners of the gym in legal trouble – especially if your condition worsens because of their negligence.

• You are injured because of defective or damaged equipment – Gym owners or managers must make sure workout equipment is in perfect working condition with regular maintenance. If they don’t and the equipment ends up injuring someone, they can be held liable.
• You are injured because of another gym member’s negligence – If you are injured because of another gym member’s negligence (if someone dropped a kettle bell on your foot by accident), the individual responsible, as well as the gym, may be held liable. That’s because they failed to provide an environment that could prevent such accidents and failed to remove the individual who made their gym hazardous for other members.

However, if you get hurt at a gym because of your carelessness, the gym cannot be held liable for your injuries. A good example is if you used faulty gym equipment, which was obviously unfit for use and you got injured as a result. According to the law, those actions were out of their control.

When you are working out at a gym, the last thing you may expect is an accident. The gym owners and managers are responsible for ensuring equipment and tools on the premises are fit for use and do not cause injuries. If they do, you can sue them for damages and get compensation you deserve to pay for your medical bills and more. In fact, you can also file a claim if they do not refund you if you cancel your membership within three (3) days after getting it.

 This is where the Law Offices of Robert T. Edens can help you. Our attorneys are available to offer legal services in Chicago, Waukegan, Libertyville, Woodstock and Antioch, Illinois. We have helped numerous clients recover millions in damages and can represent you just as aggressively.

Establishing product liability can be quite an arduous task as there are multiple conditions you need to meet in order to build a solid case against the company. Product liability is primarily the legal liability a manufacturer or trader incurs for producing or selling a faulty product which causes injury to the consumers. In order to substantiate and validate a claim of product liability, the injured party must prove that the injury was caused by a defect in the product. Furthermore, it is also required to prove that the person was using the product in the way it was meant to be used in order to establish product liability.

Why do you need to establish product liability?

Many people sustain injuries when using defective products and have to suffer pain along with hefty hospital bills. People even lose their lives using defective products. According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the injuries and damage caused by defective products cost Americans over $700 billion dollars every year.

In order to compensate for your injuries and pain that were caused by a defective product, it is imperative to file a claim and establish product liability in a court of law. From faulty breaking or safety mechanism in automobiles to unhygienic food, there is a whole range of products which can cause you or your loved ones injury and harm. So, in order to be compensated and to ensure that it does not happen to other people, it is vital that you file a claim and establish product liability.

How can a personal injury lawyer help you with it?

As mentioned at the beginning, establishing product liability can be quite tricky, which is why most people consult an experienced personal injury lawyer. An attorney would be able to determine the strength of your claim and present it in court in a way that would support your case. Once product liability has been established, you would be eligible to receive compensation from the company for the injuries and harm caused by their faulty product.

Most product liability claims pertain to issues such as breach of warranty, negligence, and strict liability. Each of the aforementioned issues requires different elements to be proven in the court. Simply proving the defect in the product and relating it to the injury sustained requires evidence and documentation.

For more information or to schedule a free consultation, contact The Law Offices of Robert T. Edens, P.C. today at 847-395-2200 to speak with an experienced attorney on this topic.

There are times when you can get injured because of using a particular product. It is important to understand that if you can prove that your injury is caused by a defective product, you can hold the vendor legally accountable and obtain compensation for your medical and other incurred expenses. Here are some more details of how product liability may apply in personal injury situations.

What is Product Liability?

Product liability is a legal concept where product manufacturers, suppliers and retailers are responsible for any injury which is caused using the product. The product liability is a concept that saves people from harmful products, which are not designed properly to provide an environment where they can be safely employed.

The concept of public policy is that no product should be dangerous by design. A product may also cause an injury due to poor manufacturing or the inability to inform the user about the risks involved with the use of the particular product. You can hire a product liability attorney and make a case which can then raise awareness about an issue and all product users can benefit from it.

Legal Theories

There are two legal theories in Illinois which can form the basis of a product liability lawsuit. Although hiring a personal injury lawyer will allow you to choose the right option, knowing more about these legal theories will help you select the ideal course of action.

Negligence

The negligence theory describes that you can produce legal proceedings if you can prove that the seller or the manufacturer had to provide a duty of care with their products that caused an injury. It must also be proven that this duty was breached and it was caused by an error or product problem that was known to cause such an injury, meaning that it was avoidable with the right duty of care. The injury that you suffer must be the one, directly caused by the problematic product. The duty of care can lie on either the manufacturer, the distributor or the seller of the product in different cases.

Strict Liability

This is a special law, which describes that a plaintiff has a case if they can prove an injury resulted from a defective productive, where it was clearly dangerous for the user. The strict liability theory can be applied to a defective product. The defect must have been present at the time the product was still under the control of the manufacturer who could have detected the problem to remove the product from the distribution. An experienced personal injury lawyer can help you identify the right legal action and make sure that you are covered in a product liability case.

The Illinois Law

The Law No. 735 ILCS 5/13-213 of the Illinois General Assembly describes the details of product liability. It describes how a plaintiff can apply the product liability action using various legal theories that may all suggest a condition where the product had a defect which changed its characteristics from its normal working order.

If you suffered a personal injury due to product liability in Illinois, the Law Offices of Robert T. Edens, P.C. is great for obtaining legal representation. Contact us at (847) 395-2200 or online today to schedule your initial consultation.

When you purchase a motor vehicle, equipment, appliance, or any other product, you believe that a reasonable care has been taken during its manufacturing to ensure that its construction and design will not cause any unreasonable risk of harm or injury when the product is used. Unfortunately, that is not always the case, as sometimes those products malfunction due to defects or absence of precautionary information and cause injuries to the users.

If someone is injured due to a defective product, they can file a product liability lawsuit against the responsibility part and get compensation for the damages that they sustained. There are three basic types of product liability claims, depending on what and how the injured was caused from the product.

1. Manufacturing Defects

When you are injured from a product that was defectively manufactured, maybe because of some error in the manufacturing process, you can bring a lawsuit against the manufacturer. A few examples of situations leading to this type of product liability claim may include a tainted batch of mineral water bottles containing an unhealthy or poisonous substance or a swing set with a defected frame or cracked chain. Manufacturing defects may also occur when the manufacturer uses substandard materials for making the product, or if the manufacturer did not take proper measure to supervise the assembling of a batch of products.

2. Design Defects

A majority of the product liability claims arise from design defects. This type of product liability claim is generally large scale because the design of the product is flawed. A defective design does not involve any error during manufacturing or assembling, instead the entire product line is defected because it has been designed in that way. Generally, design defects lead to mass product recalls because all the products are manufactured with a particular defect. Some examples of product liability claims due to design defects include, sunblock creams that do not protect people from sun, and instead cause skin reactions, or a vehicle designed with higher center of gravity, increasing the chances of rollover on turnings.

3. Warning/Labeling Defects

This type of product liability claim involves negligence on part of the manufacturer or distributor to provide adequate information, instructions, or warnings about the proper use of a product or implications that can arise from it. These claims entail that the company did not warn the users about their product being dangerous in some way, which is not obvious or requires diligence or taking precautions for its usage. For example, if a microwave popcorn product does not mention that the hot steam or extreme heat would come out from the packet when opened immediately after it is cooked in the microwave, or instructs about waiting for some time before opening the packet, you can file a failure-to-warn claim if you suffer from burn injuries.

In all types of product liability claims, you must be able to establish that the design or manufacturing defect, or brand’s failure to provide warnings for potential hazards caused the injury, and none of your actions or lack of skills did it. To bring a claim against the responsible party, you should consider legal help from an experienced and reliable product liability attorney to guide you through the legal process. Contact the Law Offices of Robert T. Edens, P.C. at (847) 395-2200 or online today to schedule your initial consultation.