San Diego Product Liability Attorney

When you buy a product in San Diego, California, you expect it to be safe. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. Companies cut corners and neglect safety testing to increase profits, which puts unsafe - and sometimes defective - products in consumer’s hands. When you get hurt because a product is unsafe, it’s important to reach out to the award-winning San Diego injury lawyers at Singleton Schreiber.

You may have the right to sue the manufacturer, distributor, and/or retailer for your injuries, costs, and suffering. Our experienced San Diego product liability attorneys can help you maximize your financial recovery.

Singleton Schreiber is a recognized leader in product liability litigation. Backed by decades of combined experience, our top-rated California trial attorneys are known for standing up to powerful corporations and demanding justice for the good people we represent. The results: over $2.5 billion in monetary awards.

Discover the impact our local lawyers and national resources can have on your product liability lawsuit. Contact our San Diego, CA, law office to set a time for a free initial case evaluation now.

What is Product Liability?

When a company sells a product in California, it assumes an obligation to ensure the product is safe. To encourage companies to take this responsibility seriously, the state has enacted several product liability laws allowing consumers to sue when they’re injured because of an unsafe product.

California’s primary product liability laws are based on strict liability. When a consumer is injured by a product defect, they don’t have to prove that the manufacturer was negligent. Rather, the company can be automatically responsible for resulting harm if the consumer can demonstrate that the product’s defect caused their injury.

Three types of product defects can give rise to a strict liability action: design defect, manufacturing defect, and marketing defect (failure to warn).

Design Defect

Sometimes, products are defective - or inherently unsafe - because of the way that they’re designed. When there’s a problem with a product’s design, there is no circumstance under which it won’t pose a potential threat to user health or safety.

In California, a consumer can sue a company for a design defect if the product “did not perform as safely as an ordinary consumer would have expected.”

Many times, courts will determine if the company could have executed a reasonably safer alternative design without significantly altering the product or incurring substantial costs when deciding if a design defect could have been avoided.

Manufacturing Defects

Manufacturing defects are problems that arise because of the way a particular product is put together or assembled.

The product’s design is perfectly safe, but the product becomes dangerous because the design isn’t followed. The final product “differs from the manufacturer’s design or specifications or from other typical units of the same product line.”

A manufacturing defect can affect an entire product line or a single item.

Marketing Defects

Not only do companies have to put care into how they design and manufacture their products, but also how they market them to the masses. If there’s a risk associated with the use of a product, the manufacturer (or company that sells the product) has a legal obligation to disclose that to potential consumers.

If a company fails to warn a consumer about a risk associated with the ordinary use or reasonably foreseeable misuse of a product, it can be strictly liable for resulting injuries or deaths.

While most product liability lawsuits in San Diego are based on strict liability, you may also have the right to bring a claim based on negligence or breach of warranty.

When you choose Singleton Schreiber, all you’ll have to worry about is telling your story to our personal injury lawyers in San Diego. We’ll evaluate your situation, identify your rights, and devise a strategy to force the company to take accountability for your life-changing injuries.

What Compensation Can I Recover If I’ve Been Injured Because of a Defective Product in San Diego?

When you suffer injuries because a product is inherently unsafe, you can sue the manufacturer, distributor, and/or retailer for compensatory damages in a California state court.

Compensatory damages can include both economic and non-economic awards.

Economic damages are intended to help you deal with the financial burdens associated with your injuries, including:

• Current and future medical bills
• Rehabilitation
• Nursing care
• Property damage
• Lost wages
• Temporary and/or permanent disability
• Funeral expenses

Non-economic damages, on the other hand, are intended to help you cope with the trauma you’ve experienced that are much more personal, such as:

• Pain and suffering
• Loss of consortium
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
• Chronic physical pain
• Reduced quality of life
• Mental anguish
• Inconvenience

Our product liability attorneys in San Diego may be able to seek punitive damages on your behalf, too. In California, punitive damages can be appropriate when there is clear and convincing evidence that a defendant acted maliciously, fraudulently, or with gross negligence. In matters of product liability, companies can be punished for intentionally putting an unsafe product on the market or failing to warn consumers of known safety risks.

Injured Consumers in San Diego, CA, Trust Singleton Schreiber

Whether a defective product causes spinal cord injuries, broken bones, severe burns, amputated limbs, a brain injury, or the wrongful death of a loved one, you’ll have a limited time to file a product liability lawsuit in San Diego, CA.

In most cases, you’ll have until the second anniversary of your injury to sue the manufacturer for your injuries. The statute of limitations can potentially be tolled if there’s a reasonable delay in the discovery of your injury.

You don’t have to navigate a complex legal claim against a powerful corporation on your own. Instead, focus on your recovery and trust Singleton Schreiber to fight to maximize your financial recovery.

Injured consumers and families trust our San Diego product liability lawyers because we’re passionate legal advocates who’ve forced powerful corporations to pay billions of dollars in financial awards.

Now, we’re prepared to be your most fearless advocate, too. Contact our law office in San Diego to get started. There’s no charge for your initial case evaluation.