San Diego Auto Defect Attorney
Extensive Experience Handling Auto Defect Cases
The McClellan Law Firm enjoys a national reputation for excellence in client service in complex personal injury and wrongful death litigation of all kinds, but the greatest source of our success has been our work in automotive product liability.
We have sued most of the car manufacturers in the world for serious claims ranging from defective seat belts to poor crashworthiness in a collision or rollover.
Attorney Craig McClellan has been recognized numerous times for his success in complex product liability cases, including being named San Diego Best Lawyers Product Liability Litigation Lawyer of the Year (2012, 2014 & 2019).
We at The McClellan Law Firm represent clients throughout Southern California in product liability litigation against auto manufacturers in cases where a serious or fatal motor vehicle accident was caused by a dangerous defect in design or construction.
We also handle cases where the defective component or system was not the direct cause of the accident but resulted in injuries or death that would not have occurred otherwise.
Examples of the kinds of cases our attorneys accept include:
- Seat belt failure, airbag failure, or both
- Lack of an electronic stability control (ESC) system
- SUV rollovers caused by the vehicle's inherent instability
- Defects in exotic autos, race cars, or high-performance models
- Roof crush injuries caused by inadequate structural support
- Car fires caused or worsened by a defective fuel line or gas tank design
- Head, face and eye injuries caused by defective auto windshield or window glass
- Sudden acceleration, in which the vehicle speeds or lurches forward
- Tire defects such as tread separation, belt edge detachment, or tire bead explosion
- Transmission defects, in which a car in park or neutral suddenly slips into a forward gear
Our familiarity with automotive defect claims gives our clients a substantial if obvious advantage: Instead of assuming that the other driver's insurance limits (together with your own underinsured motorist coverage) represent the upper limit of what we can recover for you, we regard that figure as a point of departure.
Crashworthiness & Auto Defects
Crashworthiness refers to those properties of a car that protect its passengers in the event of a collision. Auto manufacturers need to design vehicles that offer a reasonable degree of protection in foreseeable types of collisions. Too often, manufacturers sacrifice crashworthiness to other vehicle design and performance features, and to profit.
In auto defect cases involving crashworthiness issues, we work closely with experts to analyze the results of test data. This helps to indicate the vehicle's safety performance under different accident scenarios and the conscious choices made by the manufacturer to address or ignore deficiencies.
Drivers and passengers have a right to protection from auto accident injuries that are caused or aggravated by such vehicle crashworthiness defects as:
- Inadequate structural strength resulting in roof crush injuries
- Failure of seat belts or air bag systems
- Unreasonable risk of injury from broken windshield or window glass
- Insufficient "crumple zone" performance in head-on or rear-end collisions
- Unreasonable risk of ejection due to door latch failure
- Fires or explosions caused by defective fuel line or gas tank design
- Unreasonable risk of being driven into the steering wheel or dashboard
- Inadequate interior padding to protect against fractures or injuries to internal organs
We work effectively with design experts, engineers, and automotive safety professionals to develop and present your crashworthiness claims as thoroughly as possible. With more than $250 million in damages recovered for our clients to date, our record of success in auto defect litigation speaks for itself. Contact The McClellan Law Firm today.
Our Approach to Defective Motor Vehicle Claims
If we take on your case, we will carefully analyze the circumstances of your accident to see whether it would have been less severe if the safety systems of every vehicle involved had performed properly.
In cases where our experience and work with forensic consultants indicate a strong likelihood of liability on the part of a manufacturer, we stand an excellent chance of achieving a settlement or jury verdict for the full amount of your damages, without regard for the limits of any driver's insurance coverage. Automotive defect claims represent the largest single category of the $250 million that we have recovered over the years.
For additional information about our ability to represent your interests in a defective auto components case, contact our office for a free consultation with a San Diego auto defect attorney.