San Antonio Carbon Monoxide Poisoning Lawyers

JRE Injury Law is a San Antonio carbon monoxide poisoning and personal injury law firm that represents people injured by faulty generators and heaters, leaking vehicle exhaust and other careless sources of the gas.

Our founder, Joseph R. Echavarria, is a former Bexar County prosecutor who has handled injury claims since 2007 and recovered tens of millions of dollars for injured Texans and their families.

Carbon monoxide poisoning is an injury caused by breathing carbon monoxide, an odorless, colorless gas released when fuel burns, and it tends to damage the brain and heart because the gas binds to the hemoglobin in your blood far more tightly than oxygen does.

If a defective product, a careless company or a poorly maintained vehicle exposed you to the gas, you may pursue medical bills, lost wages, pain and suffering, and lost earning capacity. It is a personal injury claim where the first fight is proving the exposure itself, because the gas leaves no smell or stain and its symptoms look like the flu.

Call our San Antonio office at (210) 272-0101 or use our secure online contact form for a free case review. You Pay Nothing Unless You Win.

Clients rate us 5.0 stars across 343 Google reviews. When you call, you speak with a personal injury attorney, not a call center, in English or Spanish.

What does a personal injury attorney do first after carbon monoxide poisoning?

A personal injury attorney’s first job is to lock down proof that you breathed the gas, because that proof fades within hours: your blood clears, the appliance gets fixed and the readings are forgotten.

Here is what to do after an exposure:

1. Get everyone out, call 911 so San Antonio Fire Department crews can measure the air, and call CPS Energy at (210) 353-4357.
2. Go to an emergency room and ask for a carboxyhemoglobin (COHb) blood test. Severe cases may be sent to University Hospital or Brooke Army Medical Center (BAMC) for hyperbaric oxygen.
3. Leave the heater, generator or vehicle as it is. Do not let anyone repair, return or haul it away.
4. Write down who was there, what was running and when symptoms started, and photograph the vents and any detector readout.

Once you call us, we send preservation letters to the companies involved, request the fire department’s incident report and your hospital records, and arrange imaging and physician appointments so you can focus on healing.

Should I get a blood test even if I feel better?

Yes, because the gas leaves your blood within hours once you breathe fresh air or oxygen, and an early test is often the clearest record that you were exposed. Tell the ER staff how long you were near the source.

What happens when the carbon monoxide comes from a truck, bus or car?

When the gas comes from a vehicle, the claim usually runs against whoever built, maintained or dispatched it, and commercial vehicles carry their own federal rules. Exhaust seeps into a cab through a cracked manifold or a rusted pipe, and drivers often feel only drowsiness and a headache before they black out.

Two Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations speak to this directly:

• 49 CFR § 392.66 bars dispatching or driving a commercial motor vehicle, or carrying passengers, when an occupant has been affected by carbon monoxide, the gas has been detected inside, or a mechanical condition likely to create that hazard is known, until it is repaired.
• 49 CFR § 393.83(g) prohibits exhaust leaks forward of or directly below the driver or sleeper compartment, and § 393.83(f) forbids temporary exhaust repairs with wrap or patches.

These rules give a carbon monoxide lawyer a measuring stick in the 18-wheeler and commercial truck claims we build against carriers. A collision can also crack an exhaust system and turn a car accident claim into a poisoning case; order the CR-3 crash report from the TxDOT Crash Report Online Purchase System.

Is a trucking company responsible if exhaust leaked into a sleeper cab?

It can be, because dispatching a truck with a known exhaust leak breaks federal safety rules, and that violation can be used as evidence of negligence. We demand the carrier’s maintenance files under 49 CFR Part 396 before they are thrown out.

Can a carmaker be liable when a push-button car keeps running in a garage?

It may be, if the car lacked a reasonable safeguard such as an automatic engine shutoff. In 2021 Congress directed the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to require that shutoff on keyless-ignition vehicles with gas engines.

Who is legally responsible when a generator, heater or engine poisons you?

The company that designed, built, sold, installed or serviced the source of the gas can be responsible, along with any employer or carrier that let a known hazard keep running. Most of these claims fall under Texas products liability law, Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code ch. 82, or ordinary negligence:

• Manufacturers of portable generators, space heaters, furnaces, water heaters and vehicles, for design, manufacturing or warning defects
• Sellers, in the limited situations § 82.003 allows, and rental companies that skipped maintenance
• HVAC contractors, plumbers and gas-line installers who vented an appliance wrong or skipped a safety check
• Employers, fleet owners and motor carriers who ignored alarms or put off exhaust repairs

For how negligence, damages and shared fault work in any Texas case, see our full guide to Texas injury claims.

What does Texas law require to prove a product was defectively designed?

Under § 82.005, you must prove a safer alternative design existed that would have prevented or significantly reduced the risk without substantially impairing the product’s usefulness, and that was economically and technologically feasible when it left the manufacturer. For generators, that is often a CO sensor that shuts the engine off.

Does it hurt my claim if I ran the generator too close to the house?

It may reduce your recovery, but it does not end your claim, because Texas proportionate responsibility under § 33.001 bars recovery only if you are found more than 50% responsible. Manufacturers routinely blame “misuse,” so a carbon monoxide attorney asks whether the warnings were clear.

Why do injured families trust JRE Injury Law with these cases?

Families trust us because the people behind your case know Bexar County’s courts, know how to try a case and come to you while you recover. Mr. Echavarria began as a prosecutor in the criminal courts at the Cadena-Reeves Justice Center on Dolorosa Street, and most Bexar County injury cases are heard down that same street, in the civil district courts at the Bexar County Courthouse.

Since then, Mr. Echavarria has recovered tens of millions of dollars for injured clients.

Ethan L. Shaw, Of Counsel to JRE Injury Law and a partner at Shaw Cowart, LLP, is Board Certified in Personal Injury Trial Law and Civil Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. He won a jury verdict of about $70 million in Tate v. Discover Property & Casualty against an insurer that wrongfully denied an injured worker’s benefits, tried with co-counsel Tom Rhodes in the 225th District Court in Bexar County in 2009 and affirmed on appeal.

Mr. Shaw has also led cases where a product or a workplace caused lasting harm:

• Anderson v. Sandoz Pharmaceutical Corp.: a confidential settlement for a child who suffered brain damage from a defective product (Ethan L. Shaw, lead counsel)
• Rich v. Huntsman Corp.: a confidential settlement for a person left with paraplegia after an industrial accident (Ethan L. Shaw, lead counsel)

We come to your hospital bed or your home, and a named case manager keeps you updated at every step. Read what our clients say about how we handled everything while they healed. You Pay Nothing Unless You Win.

Past results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome. Every case is different and depends on its own facts. Call (210) 272-0101 or reach our team online for a free case review in San Antonio.

Where in San Antonio do we handle carbon monoxide cases?

We handle these cases across the city and Bexar County, and exposures cluster wherever engines and fuel-burning equipment run in enclosed spaces:

• Hangars, maintenance bays and logistics buildings at Port San Antonio on the Southwest Side
• Warehouses and distribution centers along I-35 and Loop 410 on the Northeast Side
• Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas and its supplier park on the South Side
• Job sites along Loop 1604 and US-281, where crews run saws and generators inside half-built structures
• Fleet yards and truck stops along I-10 and I-37
• Homes with attached garages in Stone Oak, the Medical Center and Midtown and North Central

How do future brain injury costs shape the value of a carbon monoxide case?

The value of your case equals your losses, reduced by any share of fault assigned to you and limited by the insurance available, and here the biggest losses are often the ones that have not shown up yet. Some people seem fine after the ER, then develop memory gaps, trouble concentrating, mood changes or movement problems days or weeks later, a pattern doctors call delayed neurological sequelae.

That is why adjusters push early offers. They blame your forgetfulness on stress or age and point to a “normal” reading taken after hours of oxygen.

Edmundo “Eddie” Leandro III, Of Counsel to JRE Injury Law, is a former Cameron County Assistant District Attorney and an insurance-defense trial lawyer at Lawler • Leandro. He has sat on the other side of the table, so he knows how insurers value a claim like yours.

Your claim can include:

• Hyperbaric oxygen sessions, neurology visits and neuropsychological testing
• Future therapy, medication and care
• Lost wages and lost earning capacity if you cannot return to the same work
• Pain, mental anguish and physical impairment

Under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 41.0105, medical expenses are measured by the amounts actually paid or incurred, not the hospital’s list price. If a loved one died, the family’s case becomes a wrongful death claim. Past results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome. Every case is different and depends on its own facts.

Should I settle before my neurological testing is finished?

Usually not, because a settlement is final and cannot be reopened if memory or mood problems surface later. We generally wait until your doctors can describe your long-term outlook.

How long do you have to bring a carbon monoxide claim in Texas?

You generally have two years from the injury to file suit under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003, and two years from the date of death for a wrongful death claim. Claims against a Texas government unit need written notice within six months under § 101.101, and the city charter requires notice within 90 days for claims against the City. Deadlines can pause for minors.

Work exposures add shorter clocks: Texas Labor Code § 409.001 requires notice to your employer within 30 days, and § 409.003 requires a workers’ compensation claim within one year.

Does the 15-year product clock matter for an old furnace or generator?

Yes, because § 16.012 generally bars a products liability suit against a manufacturer or seller filed more than 15 years after that defendant sold the product, unless a written warranty promised a longer safe life or a narrow exception applies. Claims against the company that installed or serviced the unit follow different rules.

Who else can you hold responsible for exposure at work?

You can often hold outside companies responsible even when workers’ compensation covers your employer, because the comp bar protects only the employer and its employees. On the job, the gas usually comes from propane forklifts in closed warehouses, gas saws used indoors and trucks idling at loading docks.

The outside companies that may answer for it include:

• The forklift or equipment manufacturer, if a defect made the engine run dirty
• The rental company or maintenance contractor that tuned, or failed to tune, a propane engine
• The ventilation or HVAC contractor that designed or serviced the building’s air exchange
• Another contractor on a shared site whose generator or saw filled the space

The OSHA permissible exposure limit is 50 parts per million averaged over an eight-hour shift (29 CFR 1910.1000, Table Z-1). Air-monitoring records and alarm logs above that line are strong evidence for a carbon monoxide poisoning lawyer to put before a jury.

Our attorneys have handled workplace equipment claims before: Shaw Cowart, LLP, where Mr. Shaw is a partner, obtained a confidential settlement in a forklift injury claim. Past results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome. Every case is different and depends on its own facts.

Can I sue my employer directly?

Usually not if your employer carries workers’ compensation, because Texas Labor Code § 408.001 makes comp benefits the exclusive remedy against a covered employer. If your employer opted out of the comp system, you can sue it directly for negligence.

What if my employer ignored the alarms?

That matters most if a worker died, because § 408.001 still lets the surviving spouse or descendants of a worker killed by the employer’s gross negligence recover exemplary damages.

What causes most carbon monoxide poisonings?

Fuel-burning equipment running without enough fresh air causes most of them, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists furnaces, portable generators and running cars and trucks among the common sources. The CDC estimates that each year more than 400 Americans die from unintentional, non-fire CO poisoning and more than 100,000 visit an emergency department.

The causes we see most include:

• Portable generators run in garages or near windows during power outages
• Gas space heaters, wall heaters and furnaces with cracked heat exchangers or blocked vents
• Water heaters vented with loose or downward-sloping pipes
• Keyless cars left idling in attached garages
• Exhaust leaks in work trucks and delivery vehicles, including UPS and FedEx trucks
• Propane forklifts and gas tools used indoors

The risk is close to home. In January 2025, police and firefighters reported seven people hospitalized after a car was left running in the attached garage of a home near Wurzbach Parkway and Blanco Road.

Why do poisonings spike during winter power outages?

They spike because people bring generators, grills and cars into enclosed spaces for heat and power. After Winter Storm Uri in February 2021, the Texas Department of State Health Services attributed 19 deaths statewide to CO from generators, grills, heaters, vehicles in enclosed spaces and ice-blocked heater vents.

Which carbon monoxide cases do we take?

We take cases where a company’s product, work or vehicle exposed you to the gas and you suffered real injuries, including:

• A portable generator or space heater that leaked or lacked a safe shutoff
• A furnace, water heater or gas appliance installed or serviced incorrectly
• A company truck, van or bus with an exhaust leak into the cab, such as an Amazon delivery van
• A rental moving truck with a faulty exhaust, handled alongside other rental truck injuries
• A keyless-ignition car that kept running in a garage
• Warehouse, plant or job-site exposure from forklifts and gas tools
• Lasting brain or heart damage, or a death, after a severe exposure

You can also browse every type of injury case we handle.

Were you poisoned by carbon monoxide in San Antonio? Talk to an attorney today

Talk to a San Antonio carbon monoxide poisoning lawyer at JRE Injury Law today for a free case review. Call (210) 272-0101 or toll-free (844) 702-0350, 24/7, or use our contact form. You Pay Nothing Unless You Win.