The Galaxy Note 7 has been nothing short of an unmitigated disaster for Samsung. Following a seemingly endless number of reports involving Note 7 devices catching fire or even exploding, Samsung took an unprecedented step of issuing a global recall for its flagship device earlier this month.
An official Note 7 recall program through the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) was initiated last week. As expected, Samsung urged consumers to stop using their devices altogether and to power down any Galaxy Note 7 units purchased before September 15. Incidentally, Samsung has since claimed that replacement devices will be available at retail outlets beginning on September 21.
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In the meantime, what will likely be an inevitable stream of Note 7 lawsuits has already begun. According to report from Reuters, a Florida man named Jonathan Strobel sued Samsung this past Friday after a Note 7 tucked away in his front pocket burned a hole through his pants. Strobel reportedly experienced severe burns on his front leg along with a severe burn to his left thumb after trying to remove the device from his pocket.
“He has a deep second-degree burn, roughly the size of the phone, on his right thigh,” Strobel’s lawyer said to Reuters. “Unfortunately for my client the recall came too late.” Notably, the aforementioned incident transpired on September 9.
The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages from Samsung for “medical bills, lost wages, pain and suffering.”
Since the Note 7’s release on August 19, the CPSC noted that Samsung received 92 separate reports involving the device’s battery going haywire. From this subset, 26 reports involved burns and 55 reports involved property damage.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve documented a few of these reports, including a man whose Note 7 exploded and caused nearly $1,400 in hotel room damage, an alleged incident where a Note 7 caused a man’s house to burn down, and a Note 7 incident which caused a parked Jeep to burst into flames.
