$13.5M awarded in suit over fan faulted in fatal fire

Jurors smacked West Chester-based fan manufacturer Lasko Products, Inc., with a $13.5 million verdict yesterday after a faulty fan motor ignited a 2005 blaze that killed a 7-year-old Germantown boy.

Lasko, the largest fan manufacturer in the United States, discovered a defect in the China-made motors in their portable fans in 1999 and developed corrective technology in 2004, said the boy's attorney Matthew D'Annunzio. But the company did not alert consumers who already had the defective fans nor report the problem to the Consumer Product Safety Commission until after Joshua Foster died on June 14, 2005, when the fan in his mother's bedroom caught fire and trapped him inside, D'Annunzio said. Joshua died of thermal burns and smoke inhalation.

After a 13-day trial in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court, jurors yesterday awarded his mother Loretta Foster Thompson $4 million and his sister Shaquilla $2 million for emotional distress, $10,000 in funeral expenses and $7.5 million to Joshua's estate. D'Annunzio, of the Blank Rome LLP law firm in Center City, also represented a 12-year-old boy who died in May 2000 after a similarly defective Lasko fan sparked a fire in his Roxborough home; that case resulted in a confidential settlement.

Attorney Jack Freedenberg, who represented Lasko, couldn't be reached for comment this morning. The company in February 2006 recalled about 5.6 million fans that were manufactured between 1999 and 2001 and sold in stores as late as 2004 due to "a potential electrical failure in the fan motor (that) can pose a fire hazard." The Consumer Product Safety Commission announced earlier this year that Lasko agreed to pay a $500,000 civil penalty for failing to report incidents of its fans' malfunctions.

Joshua's mother "feels vindicated," D'Annunzio said today. "She just really wants the word out for people who didn't hear about the Lasko recall; they should investigate the recall and protect themselves."