5 Best States for Product Liability Lawsuits

If you’ve been injured by a drug, medical device or defective product, the state you live in may affect your product liability lawsuit. It also affects the damages you can claim.

Product liability laws mean companies must pay people for the damages or injuries their faulty products cause.

Lawyers have different opinions on what makes a state “plaintiff-friendly.” However, according to product liability lawyer Brendan Smith from Simmons Hanly Conroy, a plaintiff-friendly state:

“These factors can give consumers a wider window to file suit, stronger legal tools to prove fault and the potential for full compensation when they have been harmed by a defective or dangerous product,” Smith said.

Some states are more plaintiff-friendly than others. Other states, such as Michigan and Texas, make it difficult for people to sue for injuries from defective products.

At the top of the list of plaintiff-friendly states are California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York and Louisiana, according to Trent Miracle, Managing Partner of Pharmaceutical Litigation at Flint Cooper Cohn Thompson & Miracle.

California frequently ranks as a top state for plaintiffs, and defense lawyers often call it a “judicial hellhole.” This is because the California Supreme Court allows innovative ways to expand liability laws. Along with Massachusetts, it’s also one of only two states that lets people sue a brand-name drug company if a generic version of the drug caused them harm. This is a legal concept known as innovator liability.

One reason for innovator liability is the “duty of sameness.” Under this law, generic drugs must have the same labels set by their brand-name counterparts, with few exceptions. Therefore, if an inadequate label causes someone harm, the brand-name company is responsible — even if the person took the generic version.

California has strong consumer protections in general. Miracle said the state’s liberal jury pool often results in bigger verdicts for plaintiffs. Additionally, a civil justice-leaning judiciary frequently rules in favor of consumers.

For example, a Los Angeles jury awarded 63-year-old Eva Echeverria $70 million in compensatory damages and $347 million in punitive damages in her talcum powder lawsuit. The jury found Johnson & Johnson’s talcum powder was linked to her ovarian cancer.

Illinois has some of the most plaintiff-friendly courts in the country, especially in Cook County, St. Clair County and Madison County. These courts are among the top jurisdictions in the country for asbestos litigation.

In 2024, the Illinois Circuit Court denied a Johnson & Johnson request for a new trial and upheld Theresa Garcia’s $45 million asbestos verdict.

In 2023, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed legislation allowing for punitive damages in wrongful death claims.

Illinois is also home to three large groups of product liability cases consolidated into multidistrict litigation: lawsuits about baby formula causing necrotizing enterocolitis (a severe gastrointestinal issue in premature babies), paraquat herbicides causing Parkinson’s disease and hair relaxer products causing cancer.

The American Tort Reform Foundation calls Pennsylvania a “judicial hellhole” because the state produces record-breaking plaintiffs’ verdicts and has plaintiff-leaning judges.

In 2023, a Philadelphia jury awarded $175 million to a man who filed a Roundup lawsuit, saying the herbicide caused his cancer. $150 million of that award was for punitive damages intended to punish Bayer and its subsidiary Monsanto for wrongdoing.

Pennsylvania is also home to The Complex Litigation Center, which opened in 1992 and was designed for mass tort litigation. This type of litigation involves products or actions that harm or injure numerous people. Over the years, the CLC has handled litigations for asbestos, the birth-control pill Yaz, the anti-schizophrenia medicine Risperdal and the anti-depression pill Paxil, among other product liability cases.

Plaintiffs can also sue an out-of-state defendant in Pennsylvania if the company is registered to do business there.

New York is another plaintiff-friendly state, especially for asbestos cases. For example, in 2022, a Manhattan jury awarded $23 million to James McWilliams, who got mesothelioma from asbestos exposure at work.

Like California, Pennsylvania and Illinois, New York does not cap damage awards in product liability cases. This means plaintiffs could receive large amounts of money in settlements or verdicts.

New York is home to multidistrict litigations regarding Zimmer hip prostheses, acetaminophen risks and Exactech orthopedic implants.

Like the other states previously mentioned, Louisiana has no damage caps for product liability cases. Therefore, juries can deliver massive plaintiff awards.

One example is when a Louisiana jury awarded $9 billion in punitive damages to a man who claimed the Type 2 diabetes drug Actos led to his bladder cancer. However, this amount was later reduced to about $37 million.

The State’s Court of Appeals also affirmed a $10.4 million verdict in David Stauder, Jr.’s mesothelioma case against Shell Oil. It included two $2.75 million wrongful death awards for the plaintiff’s two children.

The Louisiana Products Liability Act (LPLA) allows people to sue companies for four main reasons

One example of failure to conform to an express warranty is if a medical device company promises a hip implant will last 10 years, but it fails within months.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from the states listed above, non-friendly states make it difficult for consumers to sue companies. Two of those states are Michigan and Texas.

“Michigan and Texas can both be challenging venues for filing product liability claims. Michigan law provides statutory protections for pharmaceutical companies that can greatly limit a plaintiff’s recovery in drug-related cases, and Texas often has damage caps and stricter proof requirements that can make success more difficult, especially in complex lawsuits involving product defects or inadequate warnings,” Smith said.

Other states with caps on product liability damages include Alaska, Mississippi and Idaho. The Mississippi Supreme Court also has a history of overturning plaintiffs’ jury awards.

What Happens if You’re in a Non-Plaintiff-Friendly State?

First, discuss your state laws with your lawyer and determine how they affect you. If you are in a non-plaintiff-friendly state, you still have options. Ask your lawyer about filing your product liability lawsuit in a different state.

You may be able to file your lawsuit where the defendant resides or has its principal place of business, according to Miracle.

As explained by Smith, “A case can be transferred for reasons such as forum non conveniens, where courts determine that another location is more appropriate based on factors like availability of witnesses, evidence or the defendant’s principal place of business. In large-scale product liability litigations, cases are sometimes moved to a single federal court under multidistrict litigation procedures for consolidated pretrial matters, even if the plaintiff lives elsewhere.”

Editor Lindsay Donaldson contributed to this article.