Woman Sues Apple for $1M Over Broken Nose
An 83-year-old woman smacked her face into a see-through door at an Apple store and broke her nose. Now she's suing Apple for $1 million, claiming the tech giant's clear-glass door was clearly negligent.
Evelyn Paswall, 83, of Queens, N.Y., walked straight into a glass door at an Apple store on Long Island in December, the New York Post reports. Unimpressed by the store's sleek design, Paswall's Apple lawsuit claims the company failed to senior-proof its see-through facade.
"Apple wants to be cool and modern and have the type of architecture that would appeal to the tech crowd," Paswall's lawyer told the Post. "But on the other hand, they have to appreciate the danger that this high-tech modern architecture poses to some people."
In Evelyn Paswall's Apple lawsuit, the grandmother claims she was on a mission to return an iPhone to Apple's retail store in Manhasset. Paswall walked up to the store, but didn't realize she was headed straight into a wall of glass.
Paswall's Apple lawsuit alleges negligence "in allowing a clear, see-through glass wall and/or door to exist without proper warning."
"There were no markings on the glass, or they were inadequate," Paswall's lawyer said.
But the Manhasset Apple store currently appears to have small white warning strips affixed to its glass doors, the Post reports. It's not clear when those strips appeared.
Even if the strips were affixed in direct response to Paswall's accident, they can't be used as evidence that Apple did something wrong and later fixed it. Rules of evidence generally state that subsequent remedial measures can't be used to prove a defendant's negligence.
But a review of similar glass-door suits suggests Evelyn Paswall's Apple lawsuit may bite the dust. Courts have dismissed other glass-door negligence cases after finding the doors were "plain and obvious," Bloomberg Businessweek reports.
As for Evelyn Paswall, the former fur-company executive insists her broken nose was not a "senior moment." "I may be elderly, but I'm very active," she told the Post.
Related Resources:
- Woman Files $1M Lawsuit Against Apple for Broken Nose (ABC News)
- Proving Fault: What is Negligence? (FindLaw)
- New Evidence Seems to Confirm Apple's Poaching Lawsuit (FindLaw's Technologist)
- White iPhone Lawsuit: Apple Sues NY Teen Who sold White iPhone Kits (FindLaw's Technologist)