Allegedly defective tools and hardware from a China-based seller on Amazon have been linked to two deaths and at least one serious injury — the latest in an alarming spike in product liability lawsuits against the Seattle-based e-tailing giant, The Post has learned.
On March 25, 2024, Jacob “Jake” Todd — 30-year-old father of three in Menifee, Calif. — was working under his Toyota Tacoma when a car jack he’d bought on Amazon from Vevor, a Shanghai-based third-party seller, buckled and broke.
The grisly mishap caused fatal “blunt force trauma,” according to a January lawsuit filed on behalf of his sons in California state court in Riverside County.
In February, an Alabama truck driver, James Ryan Stokes, was using a Vevor “chain load binder” to tie down items on his flatbed truck when the chain broke, sending him violently backwards and fatally breaking his neck, according to William Poole, a lawyer hired by Stokes’ family.
The 49-year-old trucker left a wife and six children who are preparing a lawsuit against Amazon, Vevor and Austal USA, a ship manufacturer in Mobile, Ala. where the accident happened, according to Poole.
Hellbound and Down 