Product Liability

This is FindLaw’s collection of Product Liability articles, part of the Litigation and Disputes section of the Corporate Counsel Center. Product liability laws are based on the the premise that companies generally have a duty to protect consumers from potential hazards. Courts have held that manufacturers generally have more insight and knowledge about their products, so it falls to them to assume financial responsibility for any injuries or damage they cause. Law articles in this archive are predominantly written by lawyers for a professional audience seeking business solutions to legal issues. Start your free research with FindLaw.

Civil Litigation

Product Liability Articles

Honda ATV Litigation in Retrospect

In a Torrance, California, shop in 1970, engineer Joe Minton uncrated the first all-terrain vehicle (ATV) shipped to the United States from Japan. Minton's job was to test and evaluate a product that his employer, Honda, hoped would take this ...
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How Flammable Is The Mattress You Sleep On?

Did you know that most prisoners sleep on safer mattresses than you do? Years ago, the government studied the high incidents of intentionally set mattress fires in the prison system. This spawned a market for less flammable mattresses, which have ...
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How User Agreements Protect Your Business and Website

While many believe user agreements are not binding, there have been several cases that state that "clickwrap" agreements can be binding under certain conditions.The term "clickwrap" has evolved from the term "shrinkwrap" which describes the ...
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Import Compliance: Still A Hot Topic

Import Compliance has been a hot topic for U.S. Customs -- and for U.S. importers -- since 1993 when Congress passed the Customs Modernization and Informed Compliance Act (hereafter referred to as The Mod Act). The passage of the Mod Act intensified ...
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Insurers Must Pay Reasonably-Estimated, Future Asbestos Losses

Fuller-Austin Company ("Fuller-Austin"), a defendant in the asbestos litigation, filed suit seeking a declaration of its insurance coverage for tens of thousands of asbestos claims. Fuller-Austin Insulation Co. v. Fireman's Fund Insurance Co., Case ...
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Is Litigation against the Gun Industry in Maryland’s Future?

Lawsuits by or on the behalf of persons injured by handguns have historically been unsuccessful. Nevertheless, in the wake of new, emerging legal theories that focus on the alleged harm done to municipalities, as well as victims and their families ...
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It Shouldn’t be Necessary to State the Obvious

A motorcycle could be made safer by adding two additional wheels and a cab, but then it is no longer a motorcycle. The claimant was operating a Caterpillar model 920 front end loader, which is nineteen feet long and weighs 18,000 pounds. The 920 is ...
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Justice Did Prevail in McDonald’s Coffee Case

Possibly the most misrepresented case in the entire tort reform debate involves the compensatory and punitive damage award in 1994 to Stella Liebeck of Albuquerque, New Mexico, who spilled scalding McDonald's coffee on her lap in 1992. The majority ...
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Kentucky Products Liability Law: Explaining the McDonald’s coffee case.

What we read in the newspaper or see on television is not what the jury hears in a trial. Because our news reporters are only giving us summaries of cases and only tell us what they want us to learn, their opinions and reports often are misleading ...
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Killer Air Bags

For years the plaintiff's bar fought for the installation of air bags in automobiles. The technology to employ this lifesaving device was available by the mid-1970's, yet the major American auto manufacturers resisted using it until required to do ...
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