Auto Seat Defects

Broken Car Seat Defects

For more than 30 years, injured people and their families – as well as referring attorneys – have turned to Langdon & Emison for help with catastrophic injury cases involving vehicle seat defects. During that time, we have taken on the world’s largest auto product manufacturers in cases involving a range of auto seat defects, including:

• Seat Back Defects. The seat back mechanism in most passenger vehicles on America’s roads and highways is less structurally sound than a lawn chair you can purchase from a discount retailer. If a seat back collapses backward in a rear-impact crash, the seat occupant and passenger in the seat behind can be seriously injured.
• Seat Track Defects. If the force of a rear impact causes the seat tracks to separate, the seat will collapse backward and throw the occupant toward the rear of the vehicle, likely causing head and neck injuries and harm to anyone sitting in the rear seat.
• Rear Seat Defects. Many rear seats are designed to fold down to provide extra storage space. A poorly designed rear seat can malfunction in a crash, folding over on the occupant or allowing cargo to hurl forward from the trunk/hatch area.

We Have Obtained Landmark Multi-Million Dollar Verdicts in Seat Defect Cases

Langdon & Emison has a proven track record of success in cases involving defective auto seats, including landmark multi-million verdicts such as the examples below:

$59 million jury verdict, Kumar v. Toyota, Reclined Seat Failure

Langdon & Emison represented a car passenger whose legs were crushed and later amputated as a result of sliding under his seat belt in a wreck. Toyota’s failure to warn about the dangers of riding with his seat reclined led to Maryland’s largest jury verdict at the time.

$43.1 million jury verdict, Heco v. Midstate Dodge LLC, Seat Back Defect

Our firm represented a woman who became quadriplegic after the seat back in her car failed when she was rear-ended while waiting at a stop light. A Vermont jury awarded our client the largest verdict in Vermont history at the time.