The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced that the retailer Burlington Coat Factory (BCF) has agreed to pay $1.5 million in civil penalties for violating regulations affecting children’s upper outerwear, such as jackets and sweaters. The CPSC regulates, and largely prohibits, the sale of children’s outerwear with drawstrings. This…
A husband’s wrongful death lawsuit alleges that his wife’s doctor caused her death last year by prescribing a wide array of psychotropic medications. The suit further claims that the doctor defrauded her of nearly half a million dollars, which she contributed towards his research funding while under the influence of…
A new rule proposed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would require most medical devices in the country to include a unique device identifier (UDI). This is a unique code system assigned to medical devices that, according to the FDA, would allow the agency to track problems with…
A wrongful death lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeks damages from the federal government for the allegedly unlawful killings of United States citizens abroad. The families of several people killed overseas by unmanned drone aircraft are claiming violations of the decedents’ constitutional rights…
A bizarre discovery in several airplane meals has left one person injured and launched a two-country investigation. Passengers on several Delta Airlines flights found sewing needles in sandwiches included with the in-flight meals. The flights all originated in Amsterdam and were bound for the United States. Police in both the…
A federal district judge in Washington, DC has granted a pharmaceutical company’s motion for summary judgment in a lawsuit brought by a patient alleging the failure to warn of certain risks associated with the company’s drug. In Patteson, et al v. AstraZeneca, L.P., et al, the plaintiff allegedly suffered debilitating…
New safety standards set by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) affecting “play yards,” portable playpens for infants and toddlers, will begin in December. Play yards are currently subject to voluntary safety standards, but the new standards will be mandatory for all manufacturers. During the four-year period ending in…
A professional baseball player, Kouichi Taniguchi, brought an unusual claim to the U.S. Supreme Court. Taniguchi sued a hotel over an injury he sustained falling through a deck. The hotel won the case, and obtained a judgment against Taniguchi for “interpretation costs,” per a provision in federal law. Taniguchi fought…
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued a series of warnings about dog treats imported from China. Complaints of illnesses began coming in to the FDA in November 2011. It has now received more than one thousand reports relating to imported “chicken jerky” products. The situation presents a…
A study of injury-related deaths conducted by a national healthcare advocacy group, the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH), ranks the fifty states and the District of Columbia based on ten “key indicators.” These key indicators relate to laws, regulations, and initiatives undertaken by state governments. According to TFAH, they represent…