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Nail Gun Lawsuits: Verdicts in Favor of Nail Gun Makers Company Suceeds in Not Installing
Safety Device Before and after his injury, plaintiff Steven Hopkins worked for Northwest Building Systems, a manufacturer of modular homes. While at work reviewing a sheet of building specifications, Hopkins was struck in the left eye by a three inch nail and was permanently injured. At the time of this incident, a co-worker was nearby was operating a Duo-Fast pneumatic nail gun. Duo-Fast provided Northwest with nail guns and in exchange Northwest purchased all of its nails and other fasteners from Duo-Fast. Plaintiffs brought a product liability action against Duo-Fast, alleging defects in the nails and nail guns manufactured by Duo-Fast. Hopkin's theory at trial was that the nail gun which caused the injury should have been provided with a safety device known as a "drop-off," that drop-offs were not provided by Duo-Fast as standard equipment on all of its nail guns, and that some of the nails manufactured by Duo-Fast for the nail guns were of a dimension that would allow them to escape from the guns in tandem. Without the drop-off attachment, when one nail was fired another nail might also be fired from the nail gun on a different trajectory. The gun used by the co- worker did not have a drop-off attachment. After both parties presented lay and expert testimony, a jury returned a verdict for Duo-Fast. The jury determined that Duo-Fast did not manufacture an unreasonably dangerous or defective product, and that no warranties had been breached by Duo-Fast. (Idaho,1993) Jury Finds Worker at Fault Plaintiff Gerard Farra was the owner and operator of a roofing business. While installing a roof on a residence, Farra was shot in the elbow with a roofing nail driven by a pneumatic nail gun, model number N55C-1, which Farra had accidentally discharged. The nail gun was manufactured and designed by a corporate predecessor of defendant Stanley-Bostitch, Inc. The incident occurred after Farra, while standing on a plank and having hung the nail gun in his habitual manner with the gun's trigger depressed as it rested on a higher roof jack, reached down to pick up a bundle of shingles in order to place them on the next highest plank. Farra bent from the waist to pick up the bundle, and, as he stood up, his elbow hit the trip mechanism with enough force to depress it. Since the gun's trigger was also depressed (by virtue of the manner in which the nail gun was hung), and since the air hose was connected, depression of the trip mechanism caused the nail gun to fire a nail into Farra's elbow. Farra contended at trial that there were four separate defects in the nail gun. First, Farra claimed the nail gun was defective because it was equipped with a contact trip, as opposed to a "sequential trip" firing mechanism. A sequential trip is one that would require the trip mechanism to be depressed before the trigger in order for the nail gun to fire. The parties stipulated that a sequential trip in the nail gun would have prevented the accident in this case. Evidence admitted at trial showed that Stanley manufactures a sequential trip nail gun, and, indeed, holds a patent on the sequential trip firing mechanism. Second, Farra claimed the nail gun was defective because it did not contain a trigger guard, i.e., some sort of physical barrier around the trigger to prevent it from being hung in the manner employed by Farra. Third, Farra claimed that the nail gun was defective because it did not require the operator to press a button on the trigger in order to fully depress the trigger. Fourth, Farra claimed the nail gun was defective because it did not come with a hook attached to it from which the gun could be hung without the need to depress the gun trigger. Stanley defended on the grounds that the nail gun was safe for its intended use. Stanley claimed this intended use was "bump firing," which allowed the nail gun's operator to fire nails repeatedly by "bumping" the trip mechanism while continuously holding down the trigger. See Tr. of 12/2/92 at 182-85. Bump firing is not possible with a sequential trip nail gun, and Stanley pointed out that bump firing is faster than firing performed without continuous trigger depression. As to Farra's other claims, Stanley claimed that the nail gun could be safely hung in a number of ways other than that used by Farra, making a hook unnecessary, and that the trigger was sufficiently protected from inadvertent depression by other parts of the gun, making a trigger guard or a button unnecessary. Stanley also claimed that Farra had misused the product, and had assumed the risk of his own injury. (Pennsylvania, 1993) |
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