Another Child Crushed by Ikea Dresser: Lawyers

Theodore "Ted" McGee was just 22 months old
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 18, 2016 6:40 PM CDT
Another Child Crushed by Ikea Dresser: Lawyers
This product image provided by Ikea shows a Malm 6-drawer dresser, one of the units that pose a tip-over hazard.   (Ikea via AP)

Another Ikea dresser has apparently toppled over and killed a young child. Theodore "Ted" McGee was 22 months old when the unstable dresser fell and crushed him while he was napping on Feb. 14 in Apple Valley, Minn., his family's lawyers tell the Philadelphia Inquirer. His parents "didn't hear the dresser fall," says attorney Alan Feldman. "They didn't hear Ted scream." The accusation is swinging a spotlight back on Ikea, which started a program last July to help stabilize 27 million dressers after a toddler and a 2-year-old were crushed to death under similar circumstances. Under the "repair program," Ikea issued warnings and offered to send anchoring kits to customers who requested them, USA Today reported at the time.

But Ted McGee's parents had never heard about the danger or Ikea's program, their lawyers say. Janet and Jeremy McGee bought the dresser specifically for Ted, their first child after each had kids in earlier marriages. On the day Ted died, Janet was checking on him and noticed his empty bed, but figured he was just hiding somewhere during nap time. That's when she found his lifeless body under the fallen six-drawer dresser. Now the family's lawyers—who have already sued Ikea for the other two families and started a website about the crisis—are readying a lawsuit for the McGees. Ikea has offered the McGee family condolences but reminds them that anchoring the product "is an integral part of the product's assembly instructions." Federal safety regulators are investigating the case. (More Ikea stories.)

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