Defective Car Seat Ruled to Have Caused CA Woman's Neck Injuries, Paralysis | Shapiro, Washburn & Sharp

Quadriplegia, total or partial loss of control over one’s arms and legs, was the result of severe neck and head injuries a woman from Los Angeles, California (CA), when her car was rear-ended in 2006. But she did not get thrown into the steering wheel, dashboard or windshield. Instead, according to the lawyer who represented her in a defective products lawsuit against the maker of the driver’s seat in her car, the woman’s “seat broke and collapsed backwards, allowing her body to submarine rearward underneath her seat belt and shoulder restraint. Her head struck the back of the rear passenger seat,”

The impact broke four bones in her neck and permanently damaged her spinal cord, leaving her in a wheelchair and need significant in-home health care for life. In this news video, the accident victim describes her struggles since the crash:

 

Evidence presented to the jury showed the car seat’s maker, Johnson Controls, knew as far back as the mid-1990s that the seat could fail to protect passengers and drivers in collisions at speeds as low as 30 mph. Because jurors understood that Johnson Controls’ failure to recall a product it knew to be defective and unsafe for its intended purpose, they awarded the paralyzed woman a judgment of $24.7 million.

 

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As a Virginia (VA) spinal cord injury attorney, I have seen firsthand how much the lives of people who suffer severe head and neck trauma change for the worse. I congratulate the lawyers at the CA law firm of Bisnar Chase for holding the corporation whose apparent decision to put profits over protecting people accountable to the woman whose broken neck and paralysis can be traced to its negligence.

EJL