The parents’ lawyer, Jordan Merson, of Merson Law, PLLC, said the treadmill should have safety features in place that make it hard for a child to turn it on and a guard that automatically stops the treadmill if someone gets caught underneath — a feature on other treadmills.
“The Peloton treadmill does not have that guard, so it just kept going over and over and over their child, and that’s why you end up with burns like this — with third-degree burns,” Merson said.
Merson added that there have been over 70 other similar incidents.
A Brooklyn couple is suing Peloton claiming their 3-year-old son suffered third-degree burns when he got sucked under one of the fitness company’s treadmills, new court papers show.
Parents Sarah Saadoun and Ygal Saadoun, of Carroll Gardens, claim on July 5, 2020 their boy was injured by the Peloton Tread+ when he got “trapped under” the “continuously rotating belt” of the exercise machine, according to a Brooklyn Supreme Court lawsuit filed Thursday.
The tot — referred to in the court papers as SS — “sustained third-degree burns to large parts of his body” from the accident, the court documents say.
The parents told The Post that they were at a family gathering at someone else’s house when adults heard a scream from another room and turned off the machine.
“He was in so much pain and was so scared,” Sarah recalled. “Your heart breaks seeing your 3-year-old son covered in burns and screaming in pain.”
Ygal said just seeing the photos of his son again brought him to tears.
“To see his body so heavily impacted was terrifying,” the dad said. “It’s torture for a young kid to be stuck under a treadmill conveyor belt.”
Sarah described a grueling two-month recovery for her son, saying his bandages had to regularly be changed — a process which caused the boy so much agony that he was given oxycodone and even fentanyl.
“I had to hold him down as he was screaming just to change the bandages, and he had to go through that multiple times,” the mom recalled.
Sarah said her son has been traumatized and now has nightmares and wakes up screaming. And the couple’s 7-year-old daughter has also been emotionally impacted, the dad said.
The parents say Peloton knew that its treadmills posed a serious risk to kids given multiple news reports about one child dying and dozens more getting injured while using the Tread+, the court papers say.
The US Consumer Product Safety Commission even warned in April that “consumers with children at home to stop using the product immediately,” the filing says.
And the $4,295 treadmills are “currently the subject of nation-wide recalls,” the suit says.
“Defendant knew or should have known and had actual and constructive notice that subject treadmill was extremely and unreasonably dangerous, hazardous and not reasonably safe for its intended purposes and foreseeable uses,” the court documents charge.
Because of Peloton’s negligence, SS suffered “burns, scarring, disfigurement, shock, emotional distress, pain and suffering and other bodily injuries,” the filing alleges.
The parents are suing for unspecified damages.
The parents’ lawyer, Jordan Merson, of Merson Law, PLLC, said the treadmill should have safety features in place that make it hard for a child to turn it on and a guard that automatically stops the treadmill if someone gets caught underneath — a feature on other treadmills.
“The Peloton treadmill does not have that guard, so it just kept going over and over and over their child, and that’s why you end up with burns like this — with third-degree burns,” Merson said.
Merson added that there have been over 70 other similar incidents.
The CPSC released a terrifying video in April showing a kid being dragged under a Tread+.
“Peloton sells a dangerous treadmill specifically designed to be used at home with children around that literally sucks kids underneath it without stopping,” said the family’s other lawyer Nathan Werksman. “With this lawsuit, the Saadoun family hopes to recover for the trauma caused and raise awareness about the danger of Peloton treadmills.”
Peloton said in a statement: “We are currently reviewing this complaint. We care deeply about the safety of our community at Peloton and take each and every incident report seriously.
“We continue to cooperate with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) on this recall.”
Original article written by Priscilla DeGregory and Jessica Sonkin and published in the New York Post.
