RDak:
I'm offering, for no fee, a hypothetical approach that I would take to this incident. If you read what I put down, you would see a bit about how products liability, implied warranty of marketability, and a few other tort theories apply to this case.
This is a civil suit, and, is tried under a contributory negligence concept. Yes, the man is at fault. The way you would approach it is to show the gun was as well. Not put at issue is if the gun was at fault. My friend, our former police armour in this area, picked Sig Sauer P220's because, as a certified gunsmith, he found the glocks were not as safe, nor as reliable as the Sig Sauers. That's an expert's opinion, and, that would be one of the things that you would have at trial, one expert saying the glock doesn't meet the industry standard, and that the 'safety' isn't that at all, and, another saying it does. Both paid a LOT.
In some states, a violation of the law stops recovery in a civil suit. That is not the case in Kalifornia. You can have your child out of the car seat, the gun in his hand, and those are issues that will diminish the recovery on a % basis, but, if the gun contributed to the injury, fault can be found with that, as well. Heck, the car could have contributed to the discharge, we don't know.
Everyone in this forum is jumping to a conclusion. I just presented the other side. Often the 'facts' are selectively reported to get an emotional rise out of the newspaper readers, and, to sell more papers. I have NEVER won an argument in law school over a newspaper fact pattern. It has ALWAYS been that the facts are reported in a sensationalized way,
and the truth comes out later in either deposition, or trial.
I'll give you an example. The LA Times reported that criminal children had been trying to break into a school, and, had fallen through the roof. Their parents sued the school. Think of the outrage!! Burglars having the audacity to sue the people they were breaking into, and, it's a poor public school.
I went off the deep end, and, my law professor bet me something like lunch that the story was completely wrong. He was a famous tort lawyer, Richard Blumberg.
Truth came out two weeks later, on the back pages of the LA Times. This public school has a roof that children could easily hop up onto, with little or no effort. Rather then fix the roof, or, post signs, put up a fence, station a person there, anything to protect the children that the court holds the school district responsible for, and the law, they just let the kids, and, these were 4-5 grade kids, real criminals, play on the roof after school, with no supervision.
The kids weren't breaking into the school. The darn roof gave out, and they fell into the classroom, while they played, after school, waiting for the bus.
That's REAL close to criminal negligence on the part of the school district, and, the children and their parents had every right and justification to sue, and, it was settled very quickly by the school district's lawyers, and, insurance company.