NuWave Nutri-Pot Pressure Cooker Lawsuit Filed Following Serious Burn Injuries

A woman who suffered severe burn injuries after opening a NuWave Nutri-Pot pressure cooker while the contents were still under pressure has filed a product liability lawsuit against the manufacturer, saying the safety measures were ineffective and falsely advertised.

Lindsie Elaine Rossiter filed the complaint (PDF) in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan on August 19, claiming the manufacturer over-promoted the effectiveness of safety features for its NuWave 6Q Nutri-Pot Digital Pressure Cooker.

According to the lawsuit, Rossiter purchased the modern pressure cooker in about November 2017. However, while using the Nutri-Pot in August 2021, she suffered “serious and substantial burn injuries,” after she was able to rotate and open the lid while the pressure cooker was under pressure, without any indication that the scalding hot contents would erupt from the pot onto her body.

The lawsuit indicates Rossiter believed she could only open the lid if it was safe to open and the contents were not under pressure due to the supposed “Sure-Lock Safety System”, which NuWave claimed keeps the consumer safe and prevents the opening of the pressure cooker if the contents were a danger to the consumer.

“Defendant touts the ‘safety’ of its pressure cookers, and states that they cannot be opened while in use,” the lawsuit notes. “Despite Defendant’s claims of ‘safety,’ they designed, manufactured, marketed, imported, distributed and sold, both directly and through third-party retailers, a product that suffers from serious and dangerous side effects. Said defects cause significant risk of bodily harm and injury to its customers.”

The case joins a growing number of similar pressure cooker lawsuits filed in recent months, each raising similar allegations about unreasonably dangerous designs and defective safety features on several modern designs, including products sold under the Instant Pot, Crock-Pot, Ninja Foodi and other popular brands.

The most common pressure cooker injuries occur when the safety features fail to prevent the lid from being removed while the contents are still under high pressure, which can result in burns ranging from first to third degree, and typically cover a large percentage of a person’s body. These types of burn injuries can leave patients prone to infections and sometimes requiring amputations. However, other injuries linked to pressure cookers have included eye injuries, broken bones and other complications that resulted from electrocutions, spills or explosions.

As more of these electric pressure cookers have been introduced in recent years, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued several pressure cooker recalls over problems where lids were able to be opened while contents are under pressure, allowing hot contents to be expelled and causing a scald or burn injury to individuals in the immediate area.

Most recently, a massive Crock-Pot recall was issued in November 2020, impacting nearly 1 million 6-Quart Express Crock Multi-Cookers with lid locking defects, after at least 99 burn injuries were reported.