An Overview of Ohio Product Liability Law

Although claims predicated on harm caused by defective products sounding in warranty and negligence, aided and abetted by the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, existed well before the twentieth century, product liability as we now know it was initially foreshadowed in Ohio in the seminal case of Rogers v. Toni Home Permanent Co. Shortly after the true product liability revolution began, Ohio joined the revolution with the adoption of strict liability in warranty without privity in Lonzrick v. Republic Steel Corp. The Ohio Supreme Court then recognized that this approach to strict liability was no different from the more recognized concept of strict liability in tort and adopted this principle as enunciated in the Restatement of Torts. The common law evolution of Ohio product liability law culminated with abandonment of the "unreasonably dangerous" requirement of the Restatement definition and recognition that the doctrine of strict liability in tort encompassed crash worthiness or second collision liability.