Gun maker liable in shooting of boy
 

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What a bunch off crap. Gun makers are not the problem. Dumb people are the problem! :mad:

Could someone please explain to me why the manufacturer should pay $50.9 million?

I can see the genius of "a jury of one's peers" in criminal cases.
In civil cases - there must be a better method.

its a fault in the gun's design. thats why.

not being able to put the gun into safe, while unloading, imho, is a serious design flaw.

Of course, the adult is at fault as well.

I believe the bill mentioned protecting manufacturers excludes liability protection for a faulty gun, so IF the gun malfunctioned, I can see a case (although 50 million dollars seems excessive.)

Guns today are also sold with trigger locks. Why didn't the parents have it on the gun, especially with children in the house?

Maybe I'll get flamed for this, but I can see an arguement for granting rights, including the right to have a gun and to have children, based on intelligence tests.

Guns don't kill people...


It's mothers that break out of jail and take their 3 year-old son hostage at gunpoint that kill people.

i really do hope they pass that law protecting gun makers.

if someone rams a car into yours and you get paralyzed, do you sue the car maker? NO!

it's just a way to try to make some money.. i think

dimbulb, understood.

My issue is with excessive over-the-top cash awards that juries have a tendency to mandate. It's a give-away-someone-else's-money mentality. It's a once-in-a-lifetime power rush that people get and it hurts legitimate businesses, and incites people to sue in a win-the-lottery type crapshoot.
In the name of "justice" it's just plain unsavory.

The original article goes a little more into depth

<a href=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/05/08/national0416EDT0482.DTL> Orig. Article </a>

I'm curious as to why the parents are beign held responsible at all, seeing as the child is a minor, couldn't they just take any money the were liable to pay him?

I agree that the gun should be able to unload without disengaging the trigger lock. I think almost 51 million dollars is excessive.

I think that parents who leave loaded guns in the house not locked up should not be allowed to recieve punitive damages in liability cases. I think a reasonabe settlement would be for the gun manufacturer to pay the child's medical bills and be forced to recall all guns that cannot be unloaded with the safety on. Gun control is not the answer, responsible ownership and sensible design are.

This is what invites frivolous lawsuits. They need capped. Sorry, Sixate, it does look like the manufacturer produced a defective product and should be partially liable. But noone's jaw is worth that much money. This kid would not have gone on to make 50 Mil. with his flapper.

i hate thses type of cases, ill bet 50 million that it was a case based entirly on sypathy, and it was just easier fr the gun mfr to go along with it....complete and total fucking bullshit.

I agree. $50 million is absurd, even if the manufacturer was partly to blame. We all end up paying for excessive verdicts like this.

Woohoo! Free money! Now to stick my tongue in an electric socket, and sue the power company.

I wonder if this was granted in the infamous 9th District Court (or whatever court that keeps getting turned down). In any case, it'll probably get shot down in the appeals process.

And speaking of which, I wonder how 'concerned' the parents were for their child once they found out they were $50.9 million richer?

Quadraton,

Yes, this was in San Francisco, in the juridiction of the 9th Circuit and will likely be appealed to them, which they will probably uphold which will then probably be overturned.

That's a GREAT idea.

gov135, a quick question. Don't you think it's the consumers responsibility to actually take a look at the gun that they are about to buy and make sure they don't get a generic gun? What reason would someone buy that unless they were uneducated? I know when I'm looking to buy a new product I research and learn as much as possible so I don't get screwed. I think people need to take responsibility and stop blaming dumb manufacturers. We, the consumers, can make companies change if we know what we're doing. The problem is there are too many dumb people out there who don't care. Therefore, I don't care when stuff like this happens.

The gunmaker - in this case - is partially liable. Their design flaw did contribute to this accident.

$50 million hoever is absolutely absurd. They should be required to do no more than cover 1/2 of his medical bills (parents are liable for the other half) and perhaps a million or 2 at the most to compensate for the EXTREME impact that this incident had on this kids life.

The rest is entirely the parent's fault.

What kind of dumbass leaves a loaded gun at home with the kids and babysitter?

Good question and a good suggestion by Lebell about people who own guns and have children.
As to the question of how much a persons jaw is worth.
It is a fact that almost all awards get cut in by huge amounts because the insurance companies have banks of lawyers to do just that.
A cap on settlements would just mean less work for their lawyers and piddly settlements.
Most jurys give huge settlements either to punish the company or to make sure the amount the person gets is resonable.
If you had your jaw shot off, knowing that for the rest of your life things like getting jobs, a partners and not being stared at everytime you go to dinner would be worth a lot.

man... the day has finally come...my next lawsuit prediction is people getting run over by cars, and then suing FORD/GM/TOYOTA because the car didn't avoid the person.

gun makers liable for someone else's STUPIDITY IN GUN HANDLING and OPERATION???????

ABSURD.

Why was the adult handling a LOADED weapon in the immediate vicinity of a child?

why wasn't the shooter pointing the gun in a safe direction while unloading it?

I dont think you can really call this a design flaw. Most 1911 style pistols can't be unloaded without the thumb safety being disengaged. I don't know what this bryco thing is, but the 1911 type pistols are very popular.

The baby sitter should have just put the gun back, or set it up somewhere instead of trying to unload it. Esp. if he does not know how to do so.

He should have also not been pointing it at the kid.

Many similar lawsuits have been 'shot down' in court. This one probably solely because of some jury issue, or an incompetent defense, rather than real substance.

I admit I don't know a whole lot about guns and unloading and all the rest. I realize the gun has a slight design flaw, but it was a known flaw and hardly something they should be held liable for. Couple things: 1) the gun shouldn't have been anywhere near the child in the first place and 2) the babysitter shouldn't have just started unloading the gun if he wasn't sure what he was doing and he definitely shouldn't have been point it in the direction of someone when he did it.

Manufacturer's are responsible to provide a safe product to their consumers. They are not responsible for their consumers using their product in an unsafe way. Is the line a bit blurry? Sure. But it was clearly the action of the babysitter that caused the accident and not a random misfire of the gun.

At least, that's just me.

The gun should have been locked in a safe or had a trigger lock - parents fault 50%
The gun should should not have been handled or tried to be unloaded by an unskilled users. - babysitters fault 40%
The gun should have been able to be unloaded while safety is on. - Manufacturers fault 10%

I think a slightly different method of gun protection is to put maybe 1, maybe 2 blank shells in the gun before the actualy bullets. If a kid picked up the gun and pulled the trigger it would scare him shitless but there would be no harm done, and in case you actually need to use the gun its easy to fire off a round to get rid of the blank. Just a random thought.

And this is the major flaw with the US justice system. People can sue for just about any frivolous claim that they can possibly think of with a reasonable chance of winning. In other western countries these types of cases would not even make it to the dockets.

Just the facts
 

begin rant

OK, first off, this is just stupid. As someone mentioned earlier, this is like suing a car manufacturer when you get in an accident. The manufacturer is responsible for making a safe product, not enforcing safe use of the product. (I'll take issue with the whole, "It's a bad design that it has to be in fire to unload in a bit").

After doing some more digging, here is what I found.

The gun that this kid was shot with was a .38 caliber revolver. Some revolvers have a bulit in safety switch, such as Smith & Weson. Others don't, only some rugers have a safety switch. So in total it's about a 50/50 split. The bigest safety on a revolver is your finger but that's another story. The only other "safety" is if the gun is a double action, you will know you are pulling the trigger when doing so...takes quite a bit of pull as compared to if the hammer is cocked.

According to an article on the net, the "safety" this gun has is a trigger lock. A small device that fits around the trigger and trigger guard and locks in place so you don't have access to the trigger. Yes, the trigger lock can prevent you from opening the chamber to unload the gun. Poor design flaw...hell no. Even aftermarket trigger locks do this. This being said, in order to unload the gun, the babysitter had to REMOVE THE TRIGGER LOCK, a device in place so the gun can not be fired. Why did he feel he needed to unload the gun when there was a trigger lock in place? And why did he feel the need to unload the gun in the first place instead of just putting it out of the kids reach?

Here is the breakdown of the award the jury set:
Manufacturer - 10%
Distributer - 30%
Parents - 30%
Babysitter - 20%

I know this only adds up to 90% but this is what the article said. If you haven't been able to guess, I don't think the manufacturer should have to pay anything. The distributer in this case is a pawn shop where the parents bought the gun. I don't think the shop should have to pay anything either. It's a pawn shop for crying out loud. Like the people here know the workings of everything in the store or something. The guy that sold it to them was probably using the gun lock as a selling point.

The parents should pay nothing. Except for maybe putting their kids through gun safety classes since they have guns in the house. And, Yes, I have a child and loaded guns in my house. When my son gets old enough he will learn gun safety and how to handle them. He will also learn they are not toys and not to play with them.

The babysitter should pay everything, but 50.9 million dollars seems a bit excessive. This is the guy that used bad judgement while caring for 2 children. He should not have been trying to unload the gun. What was he going to do, give it back to the kids to play with after he got it unloaded? Put it up out of their reach or something.

I think you should be required to take a gun class and get a purchasing liscense before you are allowed to buy a gun. It would not have helped in this case but it could then be argued that a non-trained person was in operation of a gun he had no businees trying to unload.

If anyone can find more information about this gun, post it in this thread so we can take a look at it.

end rant

Thankfully we rarely see stories like htis in Canada. I support gun control. We have much much less violent crime because of it.

Good question, but what kind of dumbass unloads a gun pointed at someone? plus having to turn the safety off to unload the gun is poor design.


There is a bill in congress about this right now, if it goes anywhere or not....

On a side note, Congress is supposed to be passing a law that caps awards give to people who sue doctors when patients die or get injured in a direct result to a doctors decision

Stupid, sick and wrong