Canfield couple sues Wal-Mart

staff report

YOUNGSTOWN — A Canfield man who said he was seriously hurt when he hit his head and neck on a ladder at a large retail store after an allegedly defective lawn chair collapsed under him has sued the store.

Jack Stephenson of Glen Oaks Drive, and his wife, Irene, filed their lawsuit against Wal-Mart and the unidentified lawn chair manufacturer on Monday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

As the Stephensons examined lawn furniture while shopping at the Austintown Wal-Mart on June 14, Stephenson fell backward, hitting his head on the store’s portable steel stocking ladder when the lawn chair he tried to sit in collapsed, the suit said.

Stephenson was rendered unconscious and taken by ambulance to a local hospital emergency room after his fall; and he continues to experience head, neck and back pain and debilitating headaches, nausea and dizziness, the suit said.

Wal-Mart breached its duty of care to its customers by not properly maintaining and displaying the chair and by not safely storing the ladder, the suit says.

The lawsuit, which demands a jury trial, seeks “well in excess’’ of $25,000 in damages. The case is assigned to Judge Maureen A. Sweeney.

Wal-Mart officials did not respond to a request to comment.