In the city of San Luis Obispo, defective product cases may be brought to court due to negligence in the design, manufacturing, or sale of the product. State law does not require that an injured person prove a manufacturer’s negligence when a product malfunctions, but there are times when that negligence or error is obvious and a direct cause of the product’s malfunction.
A company can be held liable for a defect in a product when that risk could have been lowered or eliminated if the manufacturer had adopted a different design. The adoption of the alternative design must have been:
- Practically Feasible. The manufacturer must have had the ability to produce that product in the adopted way.
- Economically feasible. The manufacturer must have been able to afford to adopt the alternative design.
- True to the intended purpose. The alternative design must not alter the original way the product was intended to function.
If an attorney can prove that a manufacturer was negligent in the design of their product or in its manufacture, and there was an alternative or alternatives available, the company can be held liable for any injuries that were caused by its product.
For example, if a person was using a power tool with a safety guard in place, but the safety guard was not designed in such a way that it offered adequate protection, an attorney may sue the manufacturer for negligence. The attorney would then need to prove that an alternate design was feasible, would have been affordable by the manufacturer and would not have altered the purpose of the tool.
