The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (“CPSC”) has announced the largest crib recall in United States history, affecting over 2.1 million cribs. Manufactured by Stork Craft Manufacturing Inc., of British Columbia, Canada, the recalled drop-side cribs include approximately 1,213,000 units distributed in the United States and 968,000 units distributed in Canada. About 147,000 of the recalled Stork Craft drop-side cribs carry the Fisher-Price logo.
CPSC urges parents and caregivers to immediately find an alternative, safe sleeping environment for their babies, stop using the recalled cribs, and request a free repair kit offered by Stork Craft that converts the drop-side on these cribs to a fixed side. The recall warns against attempting to fix the crib’s defects without the repair kit. In ten incidents reported to CPSC earlier this year, one or more of the cribs’ mattress support brackets broke, causing the mattresses to collapse and creating a gap between the mattress and crib rails. A baby’s head can become entrapped in such a gap, leading to suffocation against the mattress. A baby or young child placed into a Stork Craft drop-side crib may also suffer serious personal injury in a fall if the drop-side detaches. CPSC, Health Canada, and Stork Craft are aware of 110 reported incidents of drop-side detachment, including 15 entrapments; 12 in the U.S. and three in Canada. Four of the reported entrapments resulted in suffocation, and reported fall injuries ranged from concussion to bumps and bruises.
Drop-side crib injury is a significant risk of child wrongful death or other harm. An infant or young child spends many hours of his or her day asleep, and potential crib defects abound. The cribs involved in the reported incidents, for example, had plastic drop-side hardware that had broken, missing, or deformed claws, connectors, tracks, or flexible tab stops; loose or missing metal spring clips; stripped screws; and/or drop-sides installed upside-down.
CPSC has been aware of the dangers of child injury posed by drop-side cribs since at least as early as 1978. With the largest crib recall in U.S. history making headlines, perhaps calls for a national drop-side crib ban will now be followed. The Suffolk County legislature on Long Island isn’t waiting. It recently banned the sale of drop side cribs starting in February 2010 under a new law prohibiting retail sale in Suffolk County of any infant crib that has three immovable sides with a fourth side that moves up and down. Suffolk County legislator Wayne Horsley introduced the crib ban, stating that consumers should not be “put at risk by drop-side cribs, a product that has long ago been proven dangerous and deadly.” Agreed.
If a defective nursery product has caused a child’s serious personal injury or wrongful death, the Law Office of Dane E. Johnson believes that the manufacturer and retailer should be held accountable. Parents seeking a child products liability lawyer may contact Portland, Oregon personal injury attorney Dane Johnson for a legal evaluation without charge or obligation. Call us toll-free call at (800) 714-3204. You may also contact us online.
Related Web Resources
Press Release, CPSC, Infant Entrapment and Suffocation Prompts Stork Craft to Recall More Than 2.1 Million Drop-Side Cribs (Nov. 23, 2009).
Joe Darrow, Drop-Side Crib Ban Passes, Times Beacon Record (Long Island, N.Y.), Oct. 15, 2009.
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