Civil liability of products

In the present case, the Court of Barcelona condemning the Damm brewery to pay a compensation as a result of death to a person who swallowed a bottle of beer that contained traces of a toxic agent used on washing the returnable containers.

 August 1, 1998 when the victim, his brother and coworkers went to take lunch the victim ordered a beer. The waiter opened the bottle in front of him and when he drinks a couple of swallows he realized that it had a bitter and bad taste. He gave to his brother to try it and he also realized that the beer to see was in bad conditions so they told the waiter please to change it and he returned the package to Damm. Hours later the man began throwing up and with diarrhea. These symptoms worsened until the 8th of the same month died of acute stomach flu.

The court concluded that the man died because of the content of the beer bottle since his brother who only took a slight sip also suffered diarrhea and vomiting for three days, while other diners did not have any kind and poisoning.

After all this happened, The Court of Barcelona sentenced Damm to pay 240,000 euros in compensation to the families of the deceased.

On the contrary, Damm alleges that the conviction was unfounded because it was not clear what caused the man's death or the kind of poisoning he suffered. That argument was invalid to them because the judge said that there were sufficient evidence to say that beer had poisoned him.

For more details about the case here you have the link where appears whole case very well explained: http://www.upf.edu/dretcivil/_pdf/mat_fernando/T82008.pdf