A distraught Barrington family has reportedly filed a wrongful death case in Cook County Court against a furniture manufacturer and a now-closed children’s furniture store. According to the lawsuit, a two-year-old child was crushed and sustained serious head trauma when a children’s dresser tipped over onto him in 2011. The child then allegedly suffocated beneath the weight of the toppled dresser. The family’s lawsuit alleges that the dresser was sold without proper warnings regarding the item’s potential for tipping over. In addition, the complaint claims the dresser should have come equipped with an anchor or other safety device as well as instructions regarding how to keep the dresser from falling over.
Following the child’s death, the Consumer Product Safety Commission reportedly issued a recall for approximately 300 of the same model of children’s dressers sold between January 2005 and December 2010. In response, the Canadian manufacturer of the dresser, Gemme Juvenile Inc., purportedly offered parents a free safety strap to secure the furniture to a wall. Despite that voluntary industry standards now require safety restraints to be provided with all new children’s dressers, the Consumer Product Safety Commission stated that the dresser at issue met current safety standards when it was manufactured.
In the State of Illinois, the parents of a minor child who died as a result of an unsafe product or another person’s negligent act may be entitled to file a wrongful death lawsuit. The Illinois Wrongful Death Act states the personal representative of a deceased individual may seek monetary compensation for the grief and pain endured by the victim’s family, any medical costs incurred prior to his or her death, loss of consortium, lost wages, funeral expenses, and punitive damages where appropriate. In general, punitive damages are only available in situations where the party who caused your loved one’s untimely death acted outrageously or intentionally. Losing a child in a preventable accident can be devastating. If your minor child was hurt or killed by an unsafe product, you are advised to contact a quality wrongful death lawyer to discuss your right to recovery.
If your child was injured or died in an accident in Chicago, please give the lawyers at Abels & Annes, P.C. a call at (312) 924-7575 today. Our hardworking Chicago personal injury attorneys are available 24 hours per day, seven days of the week to help you file your claim. For a free consultation with a caring advocate, do not hesitate to contact Abels & Annes, P.C. through the law firm’s website.
Note: Abels & Annes, P.C. does not represent the victim’s family in the above mentioned case.
More Blogs:
Heart Disease Patients in Chicago, Nationwide May be Hurt by Too Many Prescriptions, Chicago Personal Injury Lawyer Blog, March 26, 2013
Drivers More Likely to be Distracted by Cell Phones in Chicago and Throughout U.S., Chicago Personal Injury Lawyer Blog, March 24, 2013
Additional Resources:
Family sues dresser maker over toddler’s death, by Ellen Jean Hirst, Chicago Tribune