Product liability is the one area of injury law where you do not have to prove anyone was careless. Illinois applies strict liability to defective products, which means the question is whether the product was unreasonably dangerous when it left the manufacturer’s hands, not whether the manufacturer tried hard enough to make it safe. That shifts the burden meaningfully in an injured person’s favor, and manufacturers spend accordingly to defend these cases. Shammas Law Office handles defective product claims for people in Aurora and across the Fox Valley. Attorney Michael A. Shammas has recovered millions of dollars for injured Illinois clients.
Injured by a defective product? Call Shammas Law Office at 312-909-2129 for a free case review.
Three Ways a Product Can Be Defective
Manufacturing defect. The design was sound but this particular unit came out wrong. A weld that did not hold, a batch contaminated during production, a component installed backwards. These are often the most straightforward to prove because the defective item can be compared directly against the manufacturer’s own specifications.
Design defect. Every unit built to this design carries the same danger. The question becomes whether the product performed as safely as an ordinary consumer would expect, and whether a reasonable alternative design existed that would have reduced the risk without destroying the product’s usefulness or pricing it out of the market. These cases turn on engineering testimony and on what the manufacturer knew during development.
Failure to warn. The product is as safe as it can reasonably be made, but it carries a risk that users need to know about and the warnings did not communicate. Inadequate instructions fall into the same category. Buried warnings, warnings in the wrong language for the intended market, and warnings that do not convey the severity of the danger all support claims.
Everyone in the Chain of Distribution Can Be Named
Illinois allows claims against the manufacturer, the distributor, the wholesaler, and the retailer who sold the product. That matters when a manufacturer is overseas, insolvent, or otherwise beyond practical reach, because a domestic seller in the chain may still be answerable.
Illinois does provide a mechanism for dismissing non manufacturing defendants once the actual manufacturer has been identified and is properly before the court. That dismissal is not automatic and it is not permanent, and a retailer or distributor that participated in the design, altered the product, or made its own representations about safety generally stays in the case regardless. Naming the full chain early preserves options that are difficult to recover later.
Illinois Has a Second Deadline Most People Never Hear About
The ordinary two year limitations period applies, running from the injury. Underneath it sits a second and far less forgiving clock. Under 735 ILCS 5/13-213, a strict liability product claim must be brought within 12 years from the date the product was first sold, leased, or delivered by a seller, or within 10 years from the date it was first delivered to its initial user or consumer, whichever period expires earlier.
Read that carefully, because it does not depend on when you were hurt. A machine bought new in 2012 and still running on a shop floor today is generally outside the repose period even if it injured someone last week. The statute contains exceptions, including provisions addressing products that were altered after sale and express warranties extending beyond the standard period, but the default is unforgiving. This is the single most common reason a legitimate defective product claim cannot be filed, and it is why the age of the product is one of the first questions the firm asks.
Where These Cases Come From
- Vehicles and auto parts, including airbag and seatbelt failures, defective tires, fuel system fires, and stability or braking defects.
- Industrial and construction machinery, particularly missing or defeated guarding, inadequate lockout provisions, and controls that permit unintended startup.
- Medical devices and implants, where the device itself failed rather than the physician using it improperly, which separates the claim from medical malpractice.
- Consumer goods, including lithium battery fires, furniture tip overs, defective ladders, and children’s products that violate federal safety standards.
- Chemicals and industrial materials, where labeling understated exposure risks or handling requirements.
Where the injury happened on the job, a defective equipment claim often runs alongside a workers’ compensation case as a separate third party action, which is covered on the Aurora workplace accident page. Those two together are typically worth considerably more than the comp claim alone.
Recalls Help, but They Do Not Decide the Case
Federal agencies maintain public recall databases. Consumer products are tracked through Recalls.gov, and vehicles, tires, and child seats through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Checking both is worth doing immediately.
Two cautions. A recall is not required for a claim, and the absence of one proves nothing, since most defective products are never recalled at all. A recall also does not establish liability by itself, though it is strong evidence that the manufacturer knew about the hazard. What matters more is the physical product. Do not discard it, do not repair it, and do not send it back to the seller for a refund or replacement. The item itself is usually the central piece of evidence, and once it is gone the case frequently goes with it.
Fault, Damages, and Where the Case Is Heard
Illinois comparative negligence applies to these claims directly. 735 ILCS 5/2-1116 names product liability based on strict tort liability alongside ordinary negligence, so recovery is barred once a plaintiff’s share of fault passes 50 percent and reduced proportionally below it. Manufacturers argue misuse, modification, and disregarded instructions for exactly this reason.
Recoverable damages include medical expenses, lost earnings and earning capacity, pain and suffering, disability, and disfigurement, with no statutory cap in Illinois. Aurora crosses DuPage, Kane, Kendall, and Will counties, and product cases can often be filed where the injury occurred or where a defendant does business, which sometimes means more than one venue is available. Local cases frequently proceed at the Kane County Courthouse in Geneva.
Talk to an Aurora Product Liability Lawyer
Bring the product if you still have it, along with the packaging, manual, receipt, and any model or serial numbers. Photographs of the item as it was after the incident are valuable even if the product itself is gone. The firm’s Aurora personal injury lawyers handle defective product claims throughout Aurora, North Aurora, Montgomery, Oswego, Naperville, and the surrounding Fox Valley.
Call 312-909-2129, visit the Aurora office at 411 W Galena Blvd, Suite 102, or request a free case review. You pay nothing out of pocket, and you owe no fee unless the firm wins your case.
