E-cigarettes are electronic devices designed to simulate the experience of smoking. Local news reported on a Grant Park woman who claimed that a new e-cigarette that she bought exploded and almost destroyed her home. E-cigarette fires have occurred in a number of states, including Georgia, and a growing number of people are suffering severe injuries — including disfiguring facial injuries — as a result. If you are injured or suffer property damage because of a defective e-cigarette, you may be able to sue a number of parties including the manufacturer and sellers of the e-cigarette.
Types of products liability
There are three basic types of product defects in Georgia:
- Design defects — such as a poorly configured battery in an e-cigarette
- Manufacturing defects — for example, when a particular component of a single e-cigarette is poorly manufactured and causes harm
- Failure to warn — for example, when the e-cigarette warning materials fail to include proper instructions for avoiding fires
Legal strategies in products liability
Your legal strategy in a products liability case typically hinges on the type of defect that caused your harm. For example, if you sue for a design defect in the e-cigarette, you must show that the product was improperly designed and that a better design would have prevented your injuries. If you sue for a manufacturing defect, you may need to show that there was a problem with the individual e-cigarette that caused your injury. Finally, if you sue based on a failure to warn, you need to show that the injury would not have occurred but for the failure to provide information about potential risks.
Whom can you sue for products liability?
You may be able to sue a number of parties for your harm including the e-cigarette manufacturer, the designer and sellers such as retail stores and product wholesalers.
If you are injured by a defective e-cigarette or another defective product, an experienced Gwinnett and Atlanta-area products liability attorney can help you to evaluate the strength of your claims, determine who to sue and present the evidence required to support your damage claims.