Car Seats

Birmingham, Alabama

Need for Protection
Designed to protect young bodies, car seats can fail when you need them most: during an accident. Children need specially-designed protection when they ride in motor vehicles. Their little bodies are delicate, leaving them more susceptible to injuries than adults, and injuries during development can have ramifications for the rest of their lives.

Trusting modern designs and reputable companies, parents buy baby car seats and child booster chairs to keep their loved ones protected.

Product Recalls
However, car seats do not work flawlessly. Defective baby safety seats have resulted in countless injuries and deaths during traffic collisions. Since March of 1998, four major child seat manufacturers have announced five separate recalls. These recalls have involved almost 10 million car safety seats that federal regulators deemed unsafe.

But even after a car seat is recalled, it can be hard to get the unsafe seats out of parents' hands and away from vehicles. In the year 2,000 the recall completion rate was at 50 percent, up from 24 percent in 1993, but many infants suffer injuries from car seat models that are recalled but still in use. Pursuing your case against car seat companies can give them an added incentive to improve communication with their customers and get those seats off the road.

Defective Features
Most recalls don't involve the car seat's actual performance, but instead a defective part, like a handle or some feature that rotated unexpectedly. Some possible defects include:

• Shoulder straps that loosen or unfasten with force, causing full or partial ejection.
• The seat belt slot is too weak and fails to hold the seat in place.
• The seats are manufactured without the proper pelvic protection, allowing the child to slide down in the seat.

Improper Installation
Automobile accidents are the number one cause of death for children ages 5 to 14, according to the National Highway and Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA). All parents want to keep their child safe, and they're smart to buy the correct seat for their child's age and/or size. The mistake most parents make is the installation. Car seat technology is complex and studies show that more than 80 percent of parents improperly install their child's car seat. A wrong installation can be fatal.

The child's safety harness should be snug, and you should be able to slide your fingers under the chest straps. The chest clips should line up with your child's armpits. And under no circumstances should a child ever ride in the front seat of a vehicle-even with a rear-facing safety seat.

Steps toward Safety
While some important steps toward child car seat safety have been taken by the government and seat manufacturers, many infants and toddlers continue to suffer injuries from products designed to protect them.

If your child has been injured or killed and you believe a defective child safety seat is at fault, please contact the Birmingham personal injury attorneys at Burke, Harvey & Frankowski. We offer free consultations and can help your family recover the damages you deserve. Call or e-mail us today.

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