Personal Injury Lawyer: What to Learn from IKEA's Product Recalls

Swedish furniture giant IKEA has recently recalled over 29 million chests of drawers and dressers that were unstable and posed a serious risk of injuries, particularly to children.

There are various things that we do to create a safe environment for our children within our homes. We install baby locks on cabinets, use doorway guards to keep small children out of certain areas, keep small items that babies might put in their mouths out of reach, even install latches on the toilet as an extra precaution. Still, hundreds of children are tragically killed or injured in their own homes. Every hour, a child in the U.S is injured by furniture tip-over accidents.

Recently catastrophic accidents involving IKEA furniture claimed the lives of 3 toddlers who got trapped under an unanchored MALM chest which tipped over.

In February 2014, Curren Collas, a two-year-old boy tragically died when a six-drawer MALM chest tipped over and crushed him.  His mother found him trapped between the dresser and his bed.  The IKEA dresser that caused this fatality was not anchored to the wall.

Later in 2014, 23-month-old, Camden Ellis, also died after getting trapped beneath a 3-drawer MALM chest that tipped over. His dresser was also not anchored to the wall.

It was in February 2016 that cruel fate struck again leaving 22-month-old, Theodore McGee, dead after a set of unanchored drawers fell and crushed him.  Apart from these deaths, IKEA also received reports of 41 tip-over incidents involving the MALM chests and dressers, which resulted in 17 injuries to children between the ages of 19 months and 10 years old.

IKEA claims the failure of the pieces to meet the performance requirements of voluntary U.S. industry standards. These wrongful deaths and injuries could easily be prevented. IKEA acknowledged the danger these pieces of furniture presented, specifically to children and recalled a massive amount of these defective products. It serviced or refunded the purchase of more than 1 million dressers. Lives could have been saved if IKEA had acted sooner.

Eventually, IKEA ended up paying a whopping $50 million as settlement after the death of Three Toddlers. The settlement will be divided evenly among the three families. The company will also donate $150,000 to their memorial funds and $100,000 to Shane’s Foundation NFP, a children's safety organization focused on furniture tip-over prevention and education.

How common are furniture tip-over accidents?

Furniture tip-over refers to accidents in which a piece of furniture tumbles over onto a person, usually a child, resulting in various kinds of injuries, sometimes fatal.  It is estimated that 1 child dies every two weeks or is injured every 24 minutes in the U.S. from furniture or TV tip-overs.

How do these accidents occur?

• Integrally uneven furniture units that fail to meet minimum safety standards

• Pulling out the drawers of the dressers all the way.

• Children climbing the furniture

• Children playing near the furniture

• Persons bumping, pulling, hitting, or moving the furniture

A majority of the victims who are injured by tip-over furniture are under the age of 5.  Toddlers tend to get trapped under tipped furniture, leading to suffocation, damaged organs, broken bones, and other serious injuries . Tip-over accidents can also impact adults in the same way.

Furniture tip-overs occurs because the product was defectively designed or manufactured. For instance, a chest of drawers should be designed and manufactured so that the back and bottom sides are heavy enough to prevent it from falling forward when drawers are opened and a certain amount of weight is placed on the drawers. Some manufacturers don't adhere to the safety norms while creating their furniture making it unsafe and more likely to tip over. In the case of IKEA, the makers claim that the dressers are safe when attached to the wall according to the assembly instructions.

Furniture tip-over accidents are under the purview of personal injury. Give our expert personal injury lawyers a call at 844-777-2529 or contact us if your child has been injured due to furniture tip-overs. After taking into consideration the type of injury and the circumstances surrounding the accident, your personal injury attorney will be able to help you claim the right amount as compensation for medical bills and future medical treatments. A strong lawsuit can also persuade the producers and manufacturers of furniture to create safer products in the future.