A Fulton County jury said a company that manufactured a range cover installed in a recreational vehicle bore no responsibility for the injuries a toddler suffered when the top closed unexpectedly, knocking a pot of boiling food onto the child as she stood nearby.

The youngster, then 18 months old, suffered second-degree burns over much of her body and permanent scarring on her leg, according to plaintiffs attorney Matthew Wetherington of Werner Wetherington.

The child's parents originally sued five defendants, including the companies that manufactured the RV and those that serviced it, but the other defendants settled by the time the case got to trial.

Hawkins Parnell Thackston & Young partner Matthew Barr, who represented the remaining defendant, Kansas-based Airxcel Inc., said their strategic decision to try the case in Fulton County State Court paid off.

“Because all of the co-defendants settled out before trial, we had the right to transfer the case to Gwinnett County, which is where Airxcel has its registered agent,” Barr said via email.

“But we felt that we had a better chance of getting the kind of jury we needed in Fulton rather than Gwinnett so we did not move to transfer the venue. We needed a jury which would set aside the obvious sympathy, critically analyze the evidence, and hold plaintiffs to their burden of proof. We got that with this jury,” he said.

Wetherington, who tried the plaintiffs' case with Wesley Starrett of Marietta's Clay Starrett Injury Lawyers, said he enjoyed trying the case with Barr, despite the outcome.

“Matt Barr did an exceptional job and was easy to work with,” he said. The lawyers “were able to resolve every issue without problems.”

But he said an appeal is likely because of Judge Eric Richardson's decision to allow the jury to consider whether apportionment of some liability was appropriate, even though the jury delivered a straight defense verdict and never reached that issue.

“Unfortunately, although the Georgia Court of Appeals has expressly ruled that apportionment of fault is not proper in a strict liability case, the court determined that apportionment of fault must be included in all tort cases, including strict liability cases,” Wetherington said.

“This introduced questions of comparative negligence and the failure of the child's mother to discover the defective condition of the range cover. We think those considerations are improper in a strict liability case and intend to appeal,” he said.

Barr said that, given the straight defense verdict with no fault apportioned to the child's mother, “we don't see any basis for an appeal.”

According to the lawyers and court filings, the accident happened at an RV park in Katy, Texas, in 2015 where Wesley and Tifani Taylor were staying with their daughter, Presley.

The 2013 Sandpiper 366FL Travel Trailer was outfitted with a range and cooktop, and a bi-fold range cover with locking hinges on either side to hold it open when the cooking surface was in use.

Tifani Taylor was cooking a pot of vegetables on the cooktop when the cover “slammed forward,” knocking the boiling contents onto Presley, the complaint said. The complaint included photos of the child showing severe burns on her right arm, chest, abdomen and leg.

Wetherington said Presley underwent “expansive burn treatments,” including the use of biosynthetic skin grafts, for about four months after the accident.

Presley was treated at a charity hospital, so there were no medical bills included in her damages claims, Wetherington said.

Wetherington said there were settlement discussions and a mediation before Greg Parent of Miles Mediation & Arbitration Services, but the parties could not resolve their claims.

During a day-and-half trial, the plaintiffs argued that Airxcel had negligently designed the range cover, and their portion of the pretrial order claimed it could not be properly locked into the open position because the hinge was blocked by the cooking surface.

The defense account said the cover was properly designed, but the one in the Taylors' RV was “significantly deformed in a manner consistent with someone pulling hard on the cover without lifting it out of its locked position” and featured a warning that the hinges should be locked in place when it was open.

“While we disputed the allegation that the product was defective, our primary defense was on causation and the claim that this range cover caused the pot to fall off of the range,” Barr said.

He said the plaintiffs' engineering expert was Jeff Hyatt of ESI. The defense expert was John Leffler of Forcon International.

Wetherington asked the jury to award $2.2 million during closing arguments, including $1.1 million for past pain and suffering and $1.1 million for future pain and suffering.

The jury took about 3½ hours to find for the defense on Aug. 10, Wetherington said.

“We talked to the jury after the trial, and they all agreed the range cover was defective but that the mother should have recognized it and wasn't paying attention to how it should be used,” he said.

Barr said the jurors “concluded that the incident did not occur as alleged. They did not believe that Presley's injuries were caused by the product.”