$53 Million for Victim of Defective Car Seatback Injury

This video features John Romano, a Personal Injury attorney based in Florida.

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A defective car seatback failed to stay upright. This auto defect led to a mother’s traumatic brain injury. Attorney John Romano helped the family recover compensation, but the injury never should have happened.

John Romano is a personal injury lawyer based in West Palm Beach, Florida. There is no charge to speak with him about a potential case. You owe no attorney fees out of pocket. The attorney only receives compensation if the case ends in your favor.

What happened in the accident?

This car accident involved a family driving a Ford Explorer down a Florida highway. The mom was sitting in the back middle seat when the car began to fishtail. It took a hard turn. Even though the mom had her seatbelt on, she still slipped underneath it, went through a window, and landed hard on the concrete. When she landed, she sustained a traumatic brain injury.

She slipped out from under her seatbelt because the car seatback failed to stay upright. In his investigation and litigation, attorney John Romano was able to show that if Ford had used higher quality materials, it could have prevented the injury. A jury agreed, awarding the victim $53 million.

Who is liable for a defective auto part?

Any number of parties could share responsibility for a defective auto part. Some of them include:

  • The designer of the defective part
  • The automobile manufacturer (Ford, in this case)
  • The facility where the car was assembled
  • An auto repair shop for failing to make complete repairs

In many cases, the manufacturer knew that it was creating a potential safety risk by using cheap materials or poor design. Maybe they felt it was too far along in the design process to go back to the drawing board. Maybe they wanted to save money by using shoddy materials or sketchy third parties to design, build, or install the part. Far too often, companies put profits over safety, and consumers pay the price.

I was in a car accident. What should I do?

Even if you feel like you may have caused the accident, it does not hurt to speak to an attorney. Personal injury lawyers offer free consultations, so there’s no charge to find out if you have a potential case. If you don’t, the attorney will be upfront with you. They don’t want to waste their time or yours pursuing a case without merit.

However, if you do, then you won’t owe any out of pocket attorney fees. Injury attorneys work on contingency, so any attorney fees would be subtracted from your verdict or settlement. If your case doesn’t work out in your favor, then you owe no fees.

A successful verdict or settlement can compensate you for your medical bills, your auto repair costs, any ongoing medical treatment, any wages you lost from missing work, and any losses you expect to have going forward. It can also compensate for the things that are harder to put a price on, like loss of limb, loss of a loved one, disfigurement, and pain and suffering, just to name a few.

Find answers and peace of mind now by contacting an attorney and asking about your options.

You can reach John Romano by calling 888-981-1050 or by submitting a contact form on this page.

Video Transcript:

Years ago I had a seatback defect case. The name of the case was Robinson v. Ford Motor Company and Mrs. Robinson is a mom and a wife. She's a schoolteacher and they're driving along on a highway in Florida and Dad is driving. Mom is in the back middle seat next to her baby, who is in a rearward facing car seat and the car begins to slip and slide. The back of the car whips around to the right. The seat back fails completely and goes down for Mom. And even though she was seat belted in, she submarines out of that seat belt, hit the concrete, had a brain injury. Well, the manufacturer said "Our design of the Ford Explorer is fine. We didn't make any mistakes when we manufactured it. We followed the design, we put it together." Our experts in the case said that is nonsense. This was defectively designed, and had you taken different steps in the design to make it, in essence, stronger, of higher quality, as opposed to this cheaper quality, it would have protected people for exactly what happened in this instance. Ford Motor Company had said they didn't want to pay any money on the case and a jury came back with a verdict of $53 million. And the reason that jury spanked Ford Motor Company with that verdict is because Ford misbehaved. And the way we looked at as they misbehaved and they got spanked. Spanked by a jury who said, "We're not going to let you get away with this."

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Address:Romano Law Group1601 Belvedere RoadSuite 500-S WWest Palm Beach, Florida 33406

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