A woman is suing Apple due to her claim that her iTouch exploded and burned her in the eye, according to recent reports. The Nacogdoches, Texas, woman stated that she was lying in bed with her iTouch beside her as she listened to music. She felt a burning sensation in her eye and found that the device had exploded. An electrical shock apparently left the iTouch and burned her eye.
Mechanical Failure of Electronics Can Be Deadly
Although injury and death from mechanical failure of electronic devices is not common, these items are so ubiquitous that it is probably inevitable that some tragedies will occur. Electronics still operate on an electrical signal, and cell phones also emit radiation. While the amounts are not usually enough to kill a person, serious burns and other injuries can occur.
Death from electronic appliances is far more likely to occur when another factor such as water is involved. Every year, about 60 people die from electrocution by household products. In many cases, these electrocution deaths occur in and around water, as when a plugged-in appliance falls into a bathtub. Others are electrocuted by faulty wiring or other problems that lead to shocks from everyday objects.
Can I Sue For An Electrical Injury?
In many cases, victims of electrical injuries caused by appliances or electronics can collect damages from the manufacturer if three factors are present:
- The device must have been made or designed by the company in question. In cases where devices contain components from more than one manufacturer, more than one defendant may be named in the case, or only the manufacturer who designed or produced the defective component.
- The device must have caused personal injury or death.
- The user must have been operating the device in a way that can be construed as “normal use.”
In some cases, there are exceptions to these rules. A personal injury attorney can explain to victims the laws that apply to their particular cases.
Injury victims may be able to recover several types of damages. In the iTouch case, the victim is seeking damages for pain and suffering, compensation for her scarring, disability, and loss of enjoyment of her usual activities, as well as medical expenses, and mental and emotional distress anguish.
The plaintiff in this case is also seeking punitive damages and attorney’s fees. Punitive damages do not figure into every personal injury case; in most instances, they are awarded when a company has behaved with callous disregard for the safety of consumers. However, there is no limit on the amount of punitive damages that can be awarded, and most of the very large lawsuit settlements in history included some form of punitive or exemplary damages.
A personal injury attorney can examine your particular case and help you understand your rights and what you may be able to collect in damages. A personal injury lawyer will also help you file your lawsuit and pursue a settlement of your case.
Brandy Armantrout, 32, an Oklahoma woman, has spoken out as one of the most recent victims of the drospirenone-containing contraceptive, Yaz. According to KFOR news report, the woman says she had to have her left arm amputated as a result of taking Yaz. Armantrout says she started taking the pill back in 2007. Last December, she began to feel tingling in her left arm. When she went to the hospital, she had to be treated for severe deep vein thrombosis or blood clots in her arm. She had no pulse in her wrist. She had to be hooked up on IVs. She says she felt her hand turning black and “dying.” Surgeons had to remove her arm above the elbow.
Devastating Injuries
The amputation was a devastating blow for Armantrout, her husband and 4-year-old daughter. She also found out after the amputation that she has no medical insurance coverage for prosthetics as Medicaid will pay for prosthetics for Oklahomans younger than 21 years old. A prosthesis could cost her up to $80,000. She has also reached out to the state Vocation Rehabilitation Services, which is helping her research ways to fund prosthetics that would work for her. She is moving ahead with a civil product liability lawsuit against Bayer, which manufactures Yaz.
Product Liability Issues
Yaz was the top-selling birth control pill in 2008 and 2009. Yaz’s sales have been affected after Bayer has been hit with thousands of lawsuits on behalf of women who have suffered serious, sometimes deadly, complications from taking the popular medication. Side effects range from gall bladder problems, stroke, blood clots and even death. In April 2012, Bayer announced that it had updated labels for its drospirenone-containing oral contraceptives including Yaz and Yasmin.
It is understandable that most medications – whether they are prescription or over-the-counter — have some type of side effects. However, when theYaz side effects involve long-term or catastrophic health problems or death, that is unacceptable. In this case, a young woman lost her arm. It left her disabled for life.
Anyone who has been seriously injured or has suffered side effects as a result of taking prescription or over-the-counter drugs can file a product liability claim against the manufacturer seeking compensation for damages including medical expenses, lost wages, lost future income, disability, permanent injuries, pain and suffering and emotional distress. Product manufacturers have a responsibility to consumers to test anything they put on the market to ensure that it is safe. Any side effects or potential hazards must be made known to the public so consumers can make informed decisions about their course of treatment.
PHILADELPHIA — Federal prosecutors yesterday combined racketeering, murder and what they said were unprecedented hate-crime charges in a vast indictment against the woman accused of imprisoning mentally disabled adults in a basement so she could steal their benefit checks.
Linda Ann Weston, 52, charged along with four others, became the first person to be charged under a 2009 law that enhanced punishments for criminals who target the mentally disabled.
The 196-count indictment accuses Weston of racketeering, with murder among the underlying charges, for alleged crimes between 2001 and 2011. Weston is accused of neglect so severe that it killed two people, one in Virginia and another in Pennsylvania.
“ Shocking does not begin to describe the criminal allegations in this case,” U.S. Attorney Zane David Memeger said.
Weston’s October 2011 arrest brought to light what authorities said was one of the most inhumane crimes in Philadelphia’s history.
For years, they say, she held hostage four mentally disabled adults and her own niece to collect their Social Security benefit checks. She allegedly shuffled them from state to state and kept them in a locked, dungeon-like basement with little food.
