Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani is pleased to announce that Westchester Associate Alanna C. Mecca secured a complete summary judgment dismissal on behalf of a wholesale appliance distributor in a products liability action pending in Orange County Supreme Court.
The plaintiffs alleged that a gas range tipped forward when an infant climbed onto the open oven door, causing a pot of hot soup to spill and burn the child. Claims sounded in negligence, strict products liability, and breach of warranty, and were directed at all parties in the chain of distribution, including the manufacturer, retailer, delivery company, installer, and our client, the regional wholesale distributor.
GRSM argued that the distributor, as a purely passive intermediary, received the appliance in its original factory-sealed packaging from the manufacturer and forwarded it in that same condition, without opening, inspecting, modifying, or installing the unit. Mecca successfully established that under well-settled New York law, a wholesale distributor who exercises no control over a product’s configuration, handling, or installation owes no duty to end users and cannot be held liable under negligence, strict liability, or warranty theories absent special circumstances.
The Honorable E. Loren Williams, J.S.C., agreed, granting our client’s motion in its entirety, dismissing all claims.