Los Angeles Product Liability Lawyers Standing Up for the Injured
Every day, Los Angeles residents use products they trust to be safe. When a design flaw, manufacturing error, or missing warning causes injury, the consequences can change the victim’s life in an instant.
Cohen & Marzban has recovered more than $2 billion for injured clients across Southern California. With 40-plus years of experience and the Litigator Award — an honor reserved for the top 1% of trial attorneys nationwide — to our name, we’re prepared to take on negligent manufacturers, distributors, and retailers whenever their products cause harm.
Contact us today for a free consultation to discuss your legal options.
What Is a Product Liability Claim?
Under the California Civil Code, makers and sellers of consumer goods have a duty to ensure that the products they bring to market are safe. When they fail, injured consumers have the right to file a product liability claim, citing one of three legal theories:
- Design defect: The product's blueprint is inherently dangerous, meaning every unit produced poses a risk regardless of how well it was made.
- Manufacturing defect: A flaw was introduced during production, making a specific unit or batch unsafe even though the original design was sound.
- Failure to warn: The product lacked adequate instructions, labels, or warnings about reasonably foreseeable risks, leaving users unaware of the dangers.
California applies strict liability in defective product cases. This means you don’t need to prove that the company was negligent, only that the product was defective and that the defect caused your injuries. Additionally, everyone in the chain of distribution can be held liable, including the manufacturer, distributor, and retailer.
Products That Commonly Cause Serious Injuries
Product liability claims arise across a wide range of consumer categories. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), during the period from October 2022 to September 2023, consumer products were associated with the following outcomes:
- Sports and recreational equipment: Over 3.6 million emergency department-treated injuries nationally, with 157,000 involving children under five.
- Home furnishings and fixtures: Approximately three million ED-treated injuries, including over 471,000 in children under five.
- Home structures and construction materials: Roughly 3.8 million ED-treated injuries across all age groups.
- Personal-use items: Nearly 750,000 injuries, with 128,000 in children under five.
- Toys: Over 180,000 ED-treated injuries, with 76,000 affecting children under five.
- Housewares: Approximately 661,000 injuries treated in emergency departments.
Our firm handles claims involving defective motor vehicle parts, industrial equipment, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, children's products, consumer electronics, and more. If you’ve been hurt by any of these items, our product liability attorneys in Los Angeles will investigate the source of the defect and identify every party that bears responsibility.
Damages Available in Product Liability Cases
A defective product injury can affect every area of your life. Our skilled product liability attorneys in Los Angeles will work to recover compensation for the full scope of your losses, both financial and personal.
When a defective product takes someone’s life, surviving relatives may be entitled to wrongful death damages designed to repay them for funeral costs, lost financial support, and loss of companionship.
In cases involving especially reckless conduct, courts may also award punitive damages intended to punish the defendant and deter future harm.
