Personal Injury Attorneys / Automobile Accident Lawyer El Paso, Lubbock, San Angelo, Odessa, New Mexico NM TX New Mexico Texas

OUR RESULTS

Defective Product
Death Case
$468,000 Net to Client

Our client was a gentleman in his late 70’s who had purchased a new Cadillac for his wife for mother’s day. Our client had the car equipped with handicap controls so that he could operate the vehicle. This consisted of a handle on the steering wheel that was connected to the gas pedal by a metal rod that allowed you to operate the gas pedal with a hand lever. The first week of driving the car, our client’s wife got her foot caught on the rod which prevented access to the brake as she approached a stop sign. She lost control of the car and struck an embankment which resulted in her death. We sued alleging the device had been poorly designed and improperly installed to interfere with the driver’s foot. The Defendants took the position that it was physically impossible to install the rod any other way. We bought an identical Cadillac and took it to another one of their dealerships and had them install the controls. At mediation we demonstrated a correct installation was feasible. The defendants knew we had an example Cadillac with a properly installed rod. They gave up on their argument that it wasn’t feasible to install the controls properly and instead settled the case.