Consumer

MIAMI (CBS4) ― The CBS4 I-Team has learned of a lurking danger, hiding in plain sight, that could threaten your child's safety whenever they are in a store.

"It really hurt really badly," said 5 year-old Gigi Zinkel whose shopping trip with her mother ended up with a trip to the doctor.

"I was crying and the bleeding was all over the floor," recalled Gigi.
Renee Willemin knows firsthand just how Gigi and her mort Laurie Zinkel felt.

"I'm right behind him and he just tripped," said Renee Willemin describing what happened to her son, Noah.

Willemin was shopping and turned around to watch as her two year-old son Noah fell and almost put his eye out.

"I got a boo boo," said Noah.

The boo-boo, as Noah called it, was actually lacerated his eyelid and more.

"It tore through the floral cavity which is the sinus and broke several bones," said Jason Willemin, Noah's father.

The culprit behind these and other accidents taking place in stores nationwide are simple display hooks used to hold up products in hardware, toy and retail stores all over the country.

"I'm disturbed by it because it's potentially preventable," says the University of Miami's Pediatric Eye Surgeon Dr. Craig McKeown.

Dr. McKeown should know. He's been operating on children who've run into hooks for almost three decades.

In fact, Doctor McKeown, who specializes in children's eye surgery at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, has tried to warn the public about this danger ever since he saw his first case in the 1980's.

"Personally I have probably been involved in less than a dozen," Dr. McKeown said. "They come in sort of cycles of two or three. A year or two goes by and we don't see them. And then they come back again. Now, scattered over the country that may amount to a substantial number of injuries."

In fact, because no government or private agency tracks these types of accidents, there are no hard numbers to identify how many of these accidents occur.

Nationwide there have been several lawsuits involving display hook accidents where the parties settled. As part of the settlement, the parties agreed not to discuss the accidents.

Dr. McKeown said that can hurt the public at large since the problem and issue remain a secret to the communities where the accidents happen.

A CBS4 I-Team investigation was able to uncover at least 59 children and adults across the nation, including at least 2 children here in Florida, who have been injured by falling or running into display hooks.

The young victims can suffer greatly. Medical pictures show the display hooks can leave puncture holes in children's faces, permanent eye injuries, even brain damage.

"We childproof our homes so why can't we childproof stores?" Neuro Opthamologist Dr. Patricia Davis wanted to know.

Dr. Davis has performed operations on several children injured by display hooks, including an 18-month old from Lockport, Illinois which fell and ended up with a display hook impaled in his head.

"He didn't just fall and then look up at them crying," said Dr. Davis. "The child's parents had to pick him up off the hook."

The CBS4 I-Team conducted a random check of several different retail chains here in South Florida; including major retail chains such Toys R Us, Wal-Mart, Target, Sears, Macy's, Dillard's, Circuit City and Best Buy.
After visiting more than 100 stores, results were mixed.

We found potentially dangerous display hooks in all stores except the The Gap stores. In fact, every type of Gap Store including The Gap, Gap for Kids and Baby Gap all had safe hooks. None of those Gap stores in multiple locations around South Florida had any straight hooks in them, the hooks considered to be a problem.

On the other hand, some outlets of the same chain of other retail stores had the problem hooks in them while other outlets of the same chain did not.

For example, while three Disney Stores, at Miami International Mall, Aventura Mall and Dadeland Mall had no problematic hooks. One Disney Store outlet, at the Dolphin Mall, had bare display hooks everywhere including on displays only a few feet off the floor at eye level for a child.

Dr. Craig McKeown said, "The ideal solution (to this problem is to) eliminate that type of displays."

In fact, there are many other types of display hooks that are rounded, blunted or have barriers to them to prevent just these types of injuries.

"One option, redesign the hooks," said Dr. McKeown.

In many cases, safer re-designed hooks were found in the same store just feet away from the more dangerous straight display hooks.

"They're not safe at all," said Gigi Zinkel referring to the straight display hooks like the one that damaged her face.

One of the reasons stores still use the straight, potentially dangerous, hooks may be economics. Dr. McKeown said the safer designs could be more costly and it may be cost prohibitive for some retail outlets to replace millions of straight hooks with rounded or blocked hooks.

Another reason is ignorance about the dangers surrounding these hooks.

The CBS4 I-Team contacted representatives from every major retail chain where we found the hooks. All but one of those representatives said they had never heard of this problem and some didn't even think it was an issue.

Gigi Zinkel and her family say ignorance and costs should not trump safety.

The CBS4 I-Team contacted representatives at each of the 9 retail chains that used the troubling display hooks for comment; Best Buy, Circuit City, The Disney Store, Macy's, Sears, Toys "R" Us, Wal-Mart, Dillard's and Target.

Only representatives from six of the chains; Target, Sears, Toys "R" Us, Disney, Best Buy and Macy's of Florida responded back. All said they were concerned about customer safety.

While Toys "R" Us claimed to use only hooks with a ball on the end, Dr. McKeown said the ball is so small that it would not prevent a child from accidentally poking the hook in an eye.

Susan Busch of Best Buy thanked CBS4 for the email about the situation and said because of what we found Best Buy would take action to make sure these hooks are removed.

Click Here to find the complete statement from all six retail chains on our special link accompanying this story.

The problem hooks are not just a concern of U.S. retailers. The Canadian government has published several safety warnings for its citizens to watch out for these straight display hooks and beware of the danger they carry.

(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

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