Product Liability Litigation
Protecting clients, preserving reputations, ensuring justice.
The potential harm to a manufacturer from a product liability action does not stop at the cost of litigation and damages. The toll of negative publicity, customer defections, and loss of investor confidence can be devastating.
Perkins Coie’s Product Liability litigators have successfully handled product liability cases worth hundreds of millions of dollars. With more than 70 lawyers across the United States, our team’s depth and knowledge have helped national and international clients mitigate product liability risks. And when liability claims go to court, we provide experienced, proactive counsel.
We have reimagined the scope of product liability law, providing counsel to manufacturers, retailers, distributors, technology companies, and more. Global leaders turn to our team for assistance, whether they are seeking to mitigate risk, handle high-stakes lawsuits and disputes, or anything in between. We foster strong relationships with our clients to gain a deep understanding of their needs, both inside and outside of the product liability sphere, to achieve favorable results.
The firm’s history is intrinsically tied to aviation product liability, and our strength today is recognized worldwide. Chambers USA has ranked our team in Band 1 for Aviation Litigation every year since 2009 and in Band 3 for Product Liability & Mass Torts since 2022.
As national trial counsel for a variety of major manufacturers, we have a long track record of successful defense in jury trials. We have served as lead trial counsel for a breadth of product liability cases, with victories spanning 22 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.
How we help clients
- Counseling on product liability containment and lawsuit avoidance
- Litigation and trial representation
- Global, national, and regional claims coordination
- Representation before government agencies.
Our Team
Clients depend on our strategic analysis to decide on trial or alternative resolutions, while our comprehensive programs and workshops minimize product liability risks.
Informed, Strategic Response
In-house counsel, business owners, and insurance companies all rely on us to analyze cases early in their development. Our lawyers assist clients in determining whether it is in the company’s best interests to pursue an alternative resolution or go to trial.
Lawsuit Prevention
Few companies have comprehensive programs to minimize their product liability vulnerability. Employees who are unfamiliar with product liability laws, the discovery process, and the potentially severe impact of their on- and off-record communications are a common source of liability exposure. That’s why we work with enterprises to develop a risk-minimization strategy that includes:
- Audits to help identify and eliminate potential exposure.
- Counsel on drafting and negotiating sales contracts, warranties, disclaimers and indemnifications, product-use manuals, warnings, service bulletins, and recalls.
Product Liability Workshops
Since 1991, we have presented one- and two-day workshops to help companies prevent and respond to product liability incidents. These workshops feature simulations based on actual cases, requiring participants to decide, as the facts and events unfold, what steps the company and its employees should take to protect against liability. This interactive format allows workshop attendees to understand how their words and actions affect a company’s product liability exposure. Many manufacturers schedule these workshops on an annual or semiannual basis to ensure that both long-term and new employees understand that litigation prevention, risk management, regulatory compliance, and proper incident response are everyone’s responsibility.
Insights
News
Professional Experience
Recent Litigation Successes
- The Boeing Company. International arbitration panel dismissed all claims in commercial satellite case and ordered claimant to pay all of client’s attorneys’ fees.
- Twin Commander Aircraft. Summary dismissal of all claims in seven-death foreign aircraft crash; affirmed on appeal.
- Experimental Aircraft Association. Hired to appeal $10.5 million plaintiff verdict; verdict overturned and case dismissed.
- S.R. Smith. Summary judgment dismissal of all claims in quadriplegia case.
- The Coleman Company. Defense verdict in design defect and failure-to-warn case involving propane radiant heater; affirmed on appeal.
- Jeppesen. Summary judgment dismissal of all claims in 50-death accident; affirmed on appeal.
- Precision Airmotive LLC. Summary dismissal of all claims in three-death wrongful death suit in Ohio; affirmed on appeal.
- Genie Industries. Summary dismissal of wrongful death suit by estate of lift operator in industrial accident.
- Turbomeca. Obtained full dismissal of all claims against client arising from helicopter accident; client awarded full amount of counterclaim damages.