General Motors Product Liability Case



General Motors Product Liability Case

General Motors and the Product Safety Issue

General Motors Corporation is one of the world's leading car manufactures with several years of experience in the industry. Founded in 1908, the company employs over 300,000 workers around the world. Its headquarters is in Detroit Michigan while its European headquarters is located in Zurich, Switzerland. It has several renowned brands under its umbrella such as Vauxhall, Saturn, Saab, Pontiac, Opel, Hummer, Holden, Daewoo, GM, GMC, Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick, etc. Its major markets are USA, China, Canada, UK, and Germany (gm.com). General Motors is a very successful company by several standards. Although it faces several internal and external issues, it has still manages to make a mark in the automobile industry.

However, the leading automobile organization has to face a number of product safety issues and product liability lawsuits. Majority of which resulted from certain defects or faults in the cars. Product liability refers to the liability for damages against the manufacturer for damages incurred by the end user as a result of a defective product. There have been many product liability issues because of some manufacturing fault or design problem of a certain car for which the General Motors were faced by lawsuits based on strict liability (Allee et al, 2009). Strict liability is on the part of the manufacturer of products for certain types of damage caused by a defect in the products. Product liability is governed by the Product Liability Act (Product Liability Act). In the context of product liability, the manufacturer is liable for consequential damages resulting from the use of its products. This applies particularly to:

Body damage

Health

Property damage

The measure of expected security is determined by the type of product, according to the expected customer base as well as from the date of marketing. In addition, the manufacturer is only liable if the product is used as intended, if the user abuse it, the manufacturer is not responsible. Between the fault and the occurrence of damage must be a causal link (actionautozambia.com). The burden of proof both for this and for the presence of a fault lies with the injured party. There were some faults and design defects in some of the cars manufactured by the General Motors which led to liability lawsuits.

The Lawsuit and Legal Theories used by the Plaintiff

The Lawsuit

The lawsuit selected for this paper is the Smith v. General Motors Corporation. In this case, a drunk driver named Verne Prior, driving at 65 to 85 miles per hour crashed a Chevrolet station wagon from behind. The station wagon was parked on the highway due to a flat tire. Christine Smith, the plaintiff, was on the passenger seat of the station wagon when Prior's car hit the station wagon from behind. With the impact of the hit, the station wagon was knocked into a gully and the fuel tank burst (Buckley & Okrent, 2003). The station wagon was caught on fire and the plaintiff suffered ...