Thread: The legal jungle...

In terms of justice for the manufacturer of the saws, Ryobi, I would agree they got a raw deal in that they were unfairly blamed for the accident. But I get a bit confused when I put on my "what about the greater good of the community" hat. I think this is the perspective the US courts were using- they were thinking about the population at large and are putting untold pressure on manufacturers to do way more than just build and sell saws.

Its not really fair but I think that the reason Ryobi was stitched up in this instance was because that they had already accepted and embraced the technology, but chose not to go ahead with it to save costs. All this with the knowledge that a certain percentage of users will have nasty accidents. Remember also, Ryobi saws are mass marketed to the public, not just skilled professionals or amateurs. Maybe the case would not have succeeded against a company like Attendorf, where the product is marketed and designed for skilled operators only.

All I know is that my first reaction was "get off the grass and stop blaming others for your stupid errors". But the thought of if it happened, heaven forbid, to someone I know, or indeed anyone on this forum, I changed my perspective on the issue.

Call me a paranoid, conspiracy theorist here but there may be a bigger picture to this story.
One of the comments mentioned finer details of the case. It was a workers compensation case that was awarded in favour of the plaintiff. He was injured at work, he got a payout. No big surprise. The insurance company that paid him i.e. his employers insurance company, then sued Ryobi for the cost of the insurance payout and associated legal fees because Ryobi didn't include Sawstop technology. They didn't call it Sawstop technology but there is only one manufacturer of that technology.
As Rich mentioned, Sawstop may be associated with this legal firm or the insurance company. Is this a sneaky push to have Sawstop technology legislated as mandatory?, which is what the inventor originally tried to do but failed. I don't know, I'm only speculating half a world away

What an interesting article. Didn't have time to read all of the comments (did get through a few though!), they seemed generally well argued.

Now I have a 2007 Toyota Corolla. Base model. Didn't come with ABS brakes, which on a 2007 car is a big miss. ABS could be argued to be a safety feature of last resort too.

Based on his argument, if I have a frontal prang then I could potentially sue toyota for any injuries that may have avoided if Toyota fitted ABS. What complete bollocks. The point is that the potentially injury saving technology was available if I was prepared to pay for it, regardless of who made it. My call... my risk... my responsibility.

Ahh well. I'm sure there will be an appeal...

Cheers,
Dave

Oddly enough the use of sawstop means you have to read the manual carefully! Apparently it has twelve modes which are indicated by lights. You also test for green timber that might set the cartridge off by running some through in bypass mode.
So the safety features can be circumvented and there is the possibility that a legal argument could be raised in the event of injury that the operator was merely testing for green timber.
That aside, it does seem to be a great advance in safety and may encourage other manufacturers to work out something better.
Cheers,
Jim

Just wondering, if I cut my fingers off at work. Could I then sue Saw Stop for not making a device available on panel saws.

Originally Posted by Doc0055

Just wondering, if I cut my fingers off at work. Could I then sue Saw Stop for not making a device available on panel saws.

I wonder if I did the same if I could sue Dell for not having CDTrayStop(tm) enabled?

Originally Posted by Ozkaban

What an interesting article.

My call... my risk... my responsibility.


Cheers,
Dave

And therein lies the main problem - The blame game - while there are lawyers around I don't need to take responsibility for my actions. It's always someone's fault just not mine.

I think it is high time that if you burn your backside you learn to sit on the blisters.

Regards,
Bob

Popular Woodworking has an update from Ryobi's point of view

Originally Posted by Bob38S

And therein lies the main problem - The blame game - while there are lawyers around I don't need to take responsibility for my actions. It's always someone's fault just not mine.

I think it is high time that if you burn your backside you learn to sit on the blisters.

Regards,
Bob

Spot on Bob. After all, we can always buy tatts tickets if we want the chance of a windfall. You don't have to share it with the lawyers and hopefully will still have fingers to count it.
Cheers,
Jim

Well I feel pretty chuffed this morning after reading this.

During the debate over sawstop a couple of years ago I was laughed off as a goose for suggesting this would happen......but nooooo, dazzler was right.

Originally Posted by dazzler

Well I feel pretty chuffed this morning after reading this.

During the debate over sawstop a couple of years ago I was laughed off as a goose for suggesting this would happen......but nooooo, dazzler was right.

Ah! So you're to blame for not pressing the point to Ryobi. Expect a bluey in in the post.
Cheers,
Jim

Originally, SawStop filed a petition with a US agency (CPSC Consumer Product Safety Commission, I think.) to require that their device be required for table saws. I read the filing before it was retracted. (I'm sorry now that I didn't save it on my computer.)

There were two things that really raised a red flag in my feeble mind. First was the number of amputations annually attributed to table saws. Second was some rather gory pictures. The gory pictures appeared to be more of a mauling than a slicing. My guess was that the injury pictured was made by something like a shaper.

Then I took the number of amputations and tried to reduce the numbers using logic. I tried to factor in professional, school, home woodworkers then table saws up for sale then areas of the US that were more prone to woodworkers. I think that the analysis was saying that I should be seeing 12 to 15 table saws for sale in the Los Angeles area each month. Searching through the classified ads for a table saw in both the Los Angeles Times and Orange County Register, as I had been looking for a cabinet saw, there was maybe one or two a month.

More recently, casually looking through CraigsList there just aren't that many table saws for sale.

Edit In

At a trade show (AWFS) I was talking to a SawStop representative. I saw a cartridge that had tripped and stopped the saw. The blade was probably salvagable. The SawStop rep said that one of their tech had salvaged blades from a fired cartridge. The cartridge is soft aluminium where it contacts the blade.

It is very common in the US civil justice system for each party to have engaged the services of an "expert", I suspect that this is the reason the inventor of the SawStop technology is associated with this lawsuit. He would be called as an expert witness to explain to a jury how, if his or a similar technology was in place, such an injury would not have occurred.

It is not strictly a conflict of interest in that scenario, he would only be allowed to give evidence of how the technology is designed to work. A perfectly reasonable attack on his credit as a expert witness would be to ask the following question. "As the inventor of a particular technology, and being the only manufacturer of that technology, you could expect an increase in sales if there was to be a plaintiff verdict in this case from any publicity couldn't you?"

He answers yes and his credibility in the eyes of the jury is not damaged as he appears honest and up front. Answer no and he appears discreditable in the eyes of the jury because they will come to their own conclusions in their own way about his veracity as a witness.

Given that SawStop pretty much have a monopoly in this niche market is more of a concern really. Because the plaintiff engaged him first, the respondent is disadvantaged as there is not another "expert" they can engage to provide expert evidence favourable to their case theory.

I hope that the verdict does not stand, to my mind, it is legally wrong to punish a provider of a product because they do not provide a particular feature on that product. The buyer has the right to either buy or not buy that product, that is how the marketplace works.

If the person injured is an employee, then the question should be, why were there none or inadequate safety guards in place in the first place to prevent or minimise the possibility of an injury?

Originally Posted by rrich

I have heard that the lawyers that represented the plaintif just happen to have, by a small concidence, on their staff, the inventor of the SawStop mechanism. Knowing the source of the comment, I assume that it is true.

If there ever was a conflict of interest in legal procedings this was it. It is beyond my comprehension how a jury could find in favour of the plaintif.

Originally Posted by IanW

Personally I don' want no steenking sawstop forced on me, thankyou. I prefer to keep my body parts away from spinning sawblades, and not have to rely on a bit of technology which may or may not work 2 or 4 years from now, nor do I relish the thought of replacing a $70 explosive device (PLUS an expensive saw blade - have you seen what it can do to TC teeth inserts?) when the stupid thing fires for no good reason.

On the other hand, if every saw has to have one fitted from now on, the unit prices will drop. So too will the quality, in the competition for the domestic market, so when we all get slack about personal safety because the saw is going to cater for stupidity, and it DOESN'T work, what then?

There will be a never-ending argument about how far we need to go to protect people from themselves, and as individuals, with varying levels of skill & experience, we will always have different opinions about what risks we are prepared to accept in life. The balance between the two will determine prevailing culture, and it's too much to expect the balance will always be right or that it will please everyone.

So if I'm forced to fit a sawstop, the first thing I'll do is disable it. Then if I cut my hand off, I'm going to sue the manufacturer for not making it tamper-proof....

I'll give you an analogy.

maybe as recently as 20 years ago almost anyone could buy a Ramset explosive power tool — the ones you put a 22 long cartridge in and then use to fire anchors into concrete.

Then after one to many incidents of "anchor went through the wall and a workmate's head" you could only buy or use the tool if you were licienced to operate it.

Now that table saws are not much more expensive than the beer for a weekend of footy, if too many bits get damaged, how long will it be before you can't buy/use a table saw without a "ticket" saying you're not "too stupid" to own one?

especially here where carelessness, stupidy, deliberatly unsafe acts are "insured" through the tax system