Ikea agreed to pay $46 million to the parents of a child who died after a recalled dresser tipped onto him, the company and lawyers for the child's family said Monday.
Jozef Dudek, 2, died of his injuries in 2017 after tipping over a 70-pound “Malm” dresser.
The furniture maker issued a recall for millions of Malm products in 2016 after the deaths of three children in Pennsylvania, Washington State and Minnesota.
The families of those children reached a combined settlement of $50 million with the Swedish company in December 2016.
In a lawsuit filed last year in Philadelphia, Jozef Dudek’s family argued that Ikea knew the dresser posed a tip-over hazard but failed to tell customers that they shouldn’t be used without being anchored to a wall.
In a statement, a company spokeswoman said that Ikea was grateful the suit had been settled.
“We remain committed to working proactively and collaboratively to address this very important home safety issue,” the spokeswoman said.
The settlement also requires IKEA to meet with the advocacy organization, Parents Against Tip-overs, and broaden its outreach to consumers about the recall of IKEA dressers, according to the Dudek's lawyers at the firm of Feldman Shepherd Wohlgelernter Tanner Weinstock Dodig.
Between 2000 and 2017, emergency rooms across the United States reported more than 28,000 tip over-related injuries and 542 deaths, according to a 2018 report from the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
More than 80 percent of those deaths involved kids younger than 14. Most included TVs, though the agency attributed 110 deaths to chests, bureaus or dressers.