Ford Pinto Product Liability Case - Research Paper Example

This was after the Ford Pinto car model by the Ford Company was involved in the death and serious injury of two persons in Indiana State. Consequently, this paper undertakes a review of the product liability that was held against Ford Motor Company. In 1970s, Ford Motor Company introduced a new car model on the market to compete against the Japanese and German imported vehicles that were on a rising popularity in the market. The new car model was known as the Ford Pinto which designed as a viable substitute to the fuel efficient and regularly smaller imported cars in the American market (Leggett, 1999).

Indeed, the new model was able to sell over three million units throughout its production period. Unfortunately, the growing demand of Ford Pinto car model was hit hard due to an accident that happened on 1972 May. On this day, Lily Gray and a thirteen years old boy Richard Grimshaw were travelling in a Ford Pinto car when they were hit from the back by another car that was at a speed of 30miles per hour. Unfortunately, the impact caused an ignition of fire that killed Lily and caused serious burns on Richard.

Consequently, a legal case was brought before the trial court by the Grimshaw family popularly known as Grimshaw vs. Ford Motor Company civil case to seek for compensation of the death and injuries suffered by Lily and Richard respectively (Leggett, 1999). The California law court found the defendant guilty of the death and injuries suffered by the victims. Thus, the defendant was instructed to award $560,000 and $2.5 million to Gray family and Grimshaw respectively. Furthermore, the court ordered the defendant to pay $125 million for punitive damages.

This was arrived at after the court was informed of the design failure of the organization in manufacturing the car. The fuel tank of the Ford Pinto car had the weakness of exploding if it was