Products Liability

Hugo Parker attorneys have been actively involved in products liability litigation in the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles for over thirty years. Today, we are litigating products liability cases throughout California and in Washington, Oregon, and Hawaii.

We understand the needs of manufacturers, suppliers, and retailers to defend cases at a cost in proportion to realistic liability – present and future. We have taken dozens of products liability cases to trial and have obtained either outright defense verdicts or relatively small net verdicts below the lowest pre-trial demands.

In addition to our extensive asbestos liability experience, our attorneys have defended cases involving a wide range of other products including automotive brake parts, skill saws, toaster ovens, e-cigarettes, boilers, furnaces, and HVAC equipment, and a multitude of others.

Case Studies

Fully Informing Juries

Parachute Counsel

Brief History of Asbestos Litigation

Virtual Trials

Socially Distanced Trials

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distant Civil Trial in San Francisco and

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I can show you what that looked like

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this is the outside of our courthouse

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and this is The Honorable Harold Khan

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he’s modeling a transparent mask it was

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the concept of the court and Council

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that the potential jurors would wear

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transparent masks as opposed to

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disguises in vorder so we could see

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their facial expressions in their

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mannerisms this is the traditional jury

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box it should hold 24 people in it and

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around it for purposes of jury selection

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but if you look at the yellow cards you

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can see it would only hold three the

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result is the balance of the jurors had

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to be spread out throughout the

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courtroom and here is the back of the

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courtroom you can see the yellow squares

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placed jurors in various positions

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including there in the cheap seats in

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the back back left

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I was also assigned out to the first

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civil socially distanced trial in

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Alameda it was originally scheduled to

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be in Oakland but because of the small

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size of the courtroom it was transferred

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to Hayward here is the Hayward court and

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again I can take you inside because the

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jurors had to be spread out

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we brought in monitors so that the

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jurors could see from different

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positions here again is the jury box it

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should hold at least 12 and again it

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holds only three and just like San

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Francisco here’s the back of the

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courtroom and you can see that the

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jurors are socially distanced throughout

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the courtroom

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the biggest challenge is a lawyer in a

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socially distant trial situation is to

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be able to persuade people who you can’t

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see in other words you can’t see all of

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the jurors at the same time as you would

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in a traditional setting sometimes you

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break the magic rule turning your back

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to a juror you don’t want to do it but

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if they’re sitting behind you that’s

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going to happen also you can’t watch

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their expressions the way they receive

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evidence so you have to find a way to

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concentrate your attention on each of

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the jurors but only for a limited time

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in other words you can’t look at a whole

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box and see them as you normally would

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foreign

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the only advantage to a socially

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distanced trial

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is that some of the jurors are not going

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to pay attention

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so if you’re

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involved in a case where lack of

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attention matters it might be better

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other than that socially distance trials

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are not better than normal trials

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thank you if you’ve never dealt with a

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socially distanced trial before you need

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to go to the courtroom early and often

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you need to figure out where the jurors

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are going to be what they can see and

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hear from their positions and then you

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need to tailor your presentation so that

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all of the jurors are involved that

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might mean bringing in 12 monitors or a

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very very big monitor or a sound

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projection system whatever it takes in

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order to persuade people you need to be

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able to contact them they need to be

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able to hear you and they need to be

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able to see you and you as the lawyer

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are the one responsible for that not the

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municipality that sets up the courtroom

Virtual Depositions

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I have significant experience with

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virtual depositions I immediately

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recognized that that is a platform

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that’s here to stay it’s not a coveted

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limited platform we are going to have

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virtual depositions and virtual

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appearances and trials moving forward so

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you need to understand what can happen

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in those virtual depositions and find

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out ways to prevent abuse when I mean

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abuse let me give you an example this is

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a plaintiff who is giving trial

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preservation testimony and his attorney

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asked him to identify a gasket by name

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the gasket is durable d-u-r-a-b-l-a

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for any of the flange types that you

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joined together as a pipefitter at the

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24th Street Marine Terminal you recall

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the brand name of any gaskets that went

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between the pipes regulus

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and when you’re saying job you look

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could you spell that for the court

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reporter

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give me a second

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thank you

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r a b l a

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okay

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um if I can just interrupt can I

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plaintiff is looking at

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did you just read something off your

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phone sir

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yes

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I’ll stipulate that I sent him a uh

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the spelling of durabra

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in that tape plaintiff’s council texted

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his own client the answer this is an

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example of the abuse that can occur in

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Virtual depositions and it requires that

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lawyers be taught how to prevent that

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abuse so traditional examination has to

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change it has to include questions like

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do you have communication with other

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people at this time what’s in the room

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do you have a phone do you have any type

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of device where you can communicate with

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anybody have you been texting have you

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been emailing do you have notes without

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that type of examination you don’t know

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what the plaintiff is relying on when

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he’s responding to questions

Virtual Jury Selection

Asbestos Trial Experience

Choice of Law Case

About Hugo Parker