A Pennsylvania Superior Court panel has upheld a defense verdict in one of the first products liability cases to be appealed in the wake of the game-changing Tincher v. Omega Flex decision that recalibrated products liability in Pennsylvania.

Although the three-judge panel ultimately determined that any errors the trial court may have made in allowing jurors to hear about safety standards outlined by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration were harmless, Judge Victor Stabile, who wrote the unanimous and precedential opinion, said the plaintiffs' narrow characterization of Tincher was off-base.

The state Supreme Court's 2014 ruling in Tincher recalibrated products liability law in Pennsylvania by doing away with the strict separation of negligence and strict liability principles. Central to that holding was the high court's decision to overrule the seminal 1978 decision Azzarello v. Black Brothers, which established that clear division.