An Ohio mom is filing a lawsuit against Apple on behalf of her son, whose "iTouch" popped in his pocket and proceeded to torch his pants. He had to be treated for second degree burns on his leg, had a hole burnt through his pants pocket and got an underwear melting to top it all off. Also, according to the lawsuit, "He continues to suffer from both physical and mental conditions which will cause him to suffer pain, mental distress, emotional distress, and otherwise for the rest of his life." Poor kid! In addition to Apple, the lawsuit seemingly randomly names 10 Apple retail employees, and wants $150,000+ and attorney fees in damages. While we've seen a couple
burnt charging cables of late, this is the first we've heard of an iPod touch "popping," and it's especially odd because the lawsuit claims the iPod was turned off at the time of the incident. Whether or not that's true, we'll be certainly keeping an eye on a trend developing here. When it comes to our children, burning pants are
everyone's business.
posted March 13th 2009 9:01PM
people who blame the people on their electronics exploding is typical of an apple owner: they worry more about their worthless company crapple than people. so sad to live in a society like this today.
Nice use of Firewind there!
maybe the kid was a liar liar, and the iPod touch knew it.
Wtf?!?....... I just purchased one!! Wonder if this is true????
with the millions of ipods out there in use for as long as they have been why is this the only case of a problem? on or off, what exactly was the boy doing when his ipod burst into flames? something about this does not sound right to me!
i can understand suing for damages, but mental distress? i've seen enough court tv to know that mental distress is not something you can get money for except in extreme cases, especially when the plaintiff is lying about the device being turned off, very fishy.
New meaning to HOT PANTS!
I wouldn't mind watching a girls pants burn might even go over and help her take them off
Actually, if you go to the read link of the original posting of this story, there are 2 links to the actual documents that the lawyer submitted to the courts for the lawsuit. Here they are for the people who don't want to go hunting:
Here's the complaint:
http://www.anemergencyparty.com/antrobus/complaint.pdf
And Exhibit 1:
http://www.anemergencyparty.com/antrobus/exhibit1.pdf
After reading the complaint, I am no lawyer or have any real education in law but here is my two cents on it. I have to say that this is not going to go to far in court. For one, from what I can see the plaintiffs have no said "iTouch" in their possession. ( All they have to prove that said item that caused said damages was an iPod touch is a reciept which is what exhibit 1 is. It shows that they bought an iPod touch from an Apple store.) I understand that said "iTouch" "pop" and proceeded to catch on fire but there should still be something left to prove that such item was an "iTouch" and that such item was the reason for the said fire. I might be wrong and the plaintiffs might have said item and not releasing it as evidences until this goes to trial seeing that the "plaintiffs hereby demand a trial by jury" which in myopinion can play against the plaintiffs but if that is not the case, any court will not let this suit continue.
The second thing that is going to be hard to prove is that these "10 Doe's" knew that said product, if it was an Apple iPod touch, had the potential to fail and ultimately catch on fire and cause harm. As some of you guys pointed out it is not the responsibility of employees of a retail store to test every product that comes into the store for any defects before they sale it. This is why majority of your products come with a warranty against defects just in case something does go wrong. That said it will also be hard to prove that Apple Inc., and not Apple Computer Inc., (as the lawyer has called the defendant numerous of times in the complaint, but that is for a different paragraph) knew that said item was defected and still shipped it out to be sold. From what Apple said at the OS 3.0 event is that "they have sold over 30 millioniPhones and iPod touch", I believe that Apple is doing an outstanding job in QA if only a handful of their products have failed in which the product "pop" and proceed to catch fire. With that said, it will be hard to prove that Apple did any wrong doing or was negligent.
To wrap this up, I believe that this suit will be get kick out of court and the plaintiffs lawyer is going to have to change some of his claims. For starters change the defendants name from Apple Computer Inc to Apple Inc. Technically yes it is the same company but if your going to sue a company that is in operations today you need to use the name that said company is using at thismoment. Secondly, I believe that he needs to drop the "10 Doe's" from the suit and just sue Apple Inc. But all this doesn't matter if they do not have the said product in question to prove that it was a)an iPod touch and b)a Product made by Apple Inc., they have no case.
-Matt
I am a mom of 6 I just had an ipod touch first generation pop and smoke in my hands, It was turned off and not plugged in. I bought it for my daughter for Christmas 08. My finger tips are blistered. Just thought I would add this is does happen. I do not have a law suit but would like my ipod replaced by apple I did call in a complaint. See what happens it burned my carpet to it was so hot. I used to fix computers for a living (laptops) I have never seen this happen. I am not a law suit type person. I do not have the time.