West Seneca, New York | $360,000 | Product Liability
This case settled for $360,000 during the second week of trial. Ballow was trying the case for a 39-year-old car dealership salesman who fell from a defective ladder that slipped out from under him at home. He had purchased this 24-foot extension ladder from Sears and had leaned the ladder up against his garage when it slipped from under him and he fell approximately 10 feet to the driveway. It was shown during the trial that the ladder, when placed at a 65 degree angle, allowed the bare aluminum inside rails of the ladder's "fly section" to support the ladder rather than its slip-resistant rubber feet. Ballow used experts to show that this caused an insufficient coefficient of friction between the ladder and the concrete driveway and proved that, when Grimaldi reached approximately the seventh step, the ladder slipped out. Grimaldi suffered a fractured heel and a bulging disc in his low back.
