Posted on 16th March 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
brain injury, brain injury attorney, brain injury lawyer, Toyota acceleration, Toyota recall
With the Toyota acceleration debacle in the headline every day, the new twist on the story is writing about auto-safety litigation and the role attorneys are playing in the suits that have been filed against the Japanese auto maker.
On Monday The Wall Street Journal did a piece headlined “Lawyers Vie For Lead Roles In Toyota Lawsuits” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703457104575121571198599134.html?KEYWORDS=toyota+lawsuits as well as a blog on the topic. http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/03/15/pick-me-toyota-plaintiffs-lawyers-to-plead-their-cases-in-san-diego/tab/print/
There are so many cases pending against Toyota, with more to be filed, that The Journal suggested that it’s likely that many of the claims in the cases will be consolidated.
There will be a hearing held March 25 by the U.S. Judicial Panel for Multidistrict Litigation, which will be responsible for consolidating cases, in San Diego federal court.
Arsenault is conducting a “Toyota Symposium” right before the Judicial Panel hearing. One of the panels will be on “Liability Issues: The Mechanical vs. Electronic Debate.”
Over the weekend there was more news about Toyota litigation, as the Orange County District Attorney’s Office filed suit against the auto maker. The suit charges that Toyota knowingly sold thousands of hundreds of thousands of cars with acceleration problems, http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-oc-toyota13-2010mar13,0,4331092.story
The Los Angeles Times also wrote a fascinating history of auto-safety litigation, which credits lawsuits with leading to life-saving innovations to cars over the past 50 years. Those improvements include gas tanks that’s won’t explode if a car is hit in the rear, and dashboards and steering columns that absorb a body’s impact. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-toyota-litigate14-2010mar14,0,2005316.story
Posted on 4th March 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
Sudden acceleration and Toyota, Toyota acceleration, Toyota blamed for false conviction, Toyota recall
We’ve all heard of cases when an innocent man is freed from prison after someone steps forward, or new evidence appears, to clear the convicted one of his crime. A similar case has surfaced, but in this one an imprisoned man claims he should be released in light of Toyota’s admitted problem with the sudden acceleration of its some of its vehicles.
On the surface, it looks like the Toyota acceleration screw-up not only killed people, but also put a guiltless man in jail.
Koua Fong Lee is serving an eight-year term for a manslaughter conviction stemming from an accident that killed three people. Lee was driving a 1998 Toyota Camry, one of the vehicles recalled by the automaker, when the crash happened.
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/koua-fong-lee-claims-faulty-toyota-brakes-caused-deadly-accident/19380139?icid=main|main|dl1|link1|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolnews.com%2Fnation%2Farticle%2Fkoua-fong-lee-claims-faulty-toyota-brakes-caused-deadly-accident%2F19380139
Lee was 29 when the accident took place in June 2006. He was driving home from church in St. Paul, Minn., with his pregnant wife, daughter, father, brother and niece in his car.
Lee had maintained that his Camry suddenly accelerated. Obviously, a jury didn’t believe him. He crashed into several cars ahead of him, killing Javis Adams and his 10-year-old son, Javis Adams Jr. Another child, 6-year-old Devyn Bolton, also died.
During the trial, the prosecution maintained that Lee, a Laotian immigrant, has his foot on the gas when his car crashed. Two inspections done by mechanical engineers maintained that the car’s brakes were working when the crash took place.
Lee’s legal counsel plans to ask court approval to have his Camry from the accident, which is still in police custody, examined by experts who are familiar with the car’s acceleration problems
Posted on 3rd March 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
brain injury attorney, brain injury lawyer, Sudden acceleration and Toyota, Toyota recall
Toyota is far from off the hook for its deadly accelerator problems, which has resulted in accidents that have killed dozens of people. Now, federal officials are weighing whether to make all trucks and cars made in the U.S. have brakes that can override gas pedals. http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/03/feds-weigh-requiring-brake-devices-on-cars-to-prevent-runaway-acceleration/1
That’s what Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said to Congress on Tuesday.
Right now Washington officials are pinning 52 deaths on Toyota vehicles that suddenly accelerated and crashed. The auto makers has issued 10 million recall notices.
But that’s not what’s most scary now. There are reports that Toyota’s vehicle recall and repairs may not be working. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has received at least seven complaints from people who claim their Toyotas have still suddenly accelerated after having their gas pedals fixed and floor mats replaced by dealerships.
Posted on 1st March 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
Aldo Toyoda and Congress, brain injury attorney, brain injury lawyer, Sudden acceleration and Toyota, Toyota recall
The story of Toyota’s deadly failure to remedy the acceleration problems with its cars had endless twists last week, when Congress held hearings on the matter.
This week, the media is offering up an analysis of what Toyota did and didn’t do, with U.S. lawmakers accusing the automaker of withholding information and other drama. For example, Time magazine did a lively review of the hearings.
http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1968086,00.html#
It’s hard to keep track of it all.
But what often gets neglected in the headlines about the Washington hearings and the official apologies by Toyota management is that people, a lot of people, died terrifying deaths because of these faulty brakes.
But these week, we got some of the heart-breaking stories of those who died when their cars accelerated, speeding out of their control.
First, the Los Angeles Times did lot of legwork and found that at least 56 people have died in accidents related to the sudden acceleration of their Toyota vehicles.
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/28/business/la-fi-toyota-deaths-mainbar28-2010feb28
That piece offers an overview of some of the circumstances and details of these crashes, which may have been avoided if Toyota had acted sooner. The common theme seems to be the terror and helplessness the victims felt before their cars sped out of control and they were killed.
The second story offers a capsule account of each of the 56 deaths, with the person’s name, date of their fatal accident and the circumstances.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/la-fiw-toyota-deaths-list28-2010feb28,0,3224161,print.story
It humanizes these people. It reminds us of when The New York Times wrote profiles of each victim of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. It put a face on those innocents.
The National Highway Safety Board has actually bought the Lexus ES 350 that was owned by hearing witnesses Rhonda and Eddie Smith of Tennessee. They described how their Lexus accelerated on a highway for six long minutes until Rhonda got control of the vehicle again.
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/02/feds-to-study-lexus-that-almost-killed-tenneessee-woman/1
Posted on 23rd February 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
Aldo Toyoda and Congress, brain injury attorney, Sudden acceleration, Sudden acceleration and Toyota, Toyota recall
Toyota Motor Corp. president Aldo Toyoda will be on the hot seat Wednesday as he answers Congress’s questions about the recall of cars plagued by potentially deadly acceleration issues. Toyoda seems to be trying to make up for the ill-conceived and defensive approach he and the auto maker have taken in this public-relations debacle. But it may be too late, in many respects.
The Wall Street Journal Tuesday has a Page One story, headlined “Support Wavers At Toyota for Chief,” about how the company’s rank-and-file employees and management think Toyoda dropped the ball in his handling of the recalls.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748703494404575081102279562036.html#mod=todays_us_nonsub_page_one
There are complaints about his lack of leadership during the company’s worst crisis in history. Even more shocking, some Toyota managers complained that they were not keep p to date about what the company’s actions relating to the recalls, and times first hearing about what was going on after reading it in the media.
Inside the same issue of The Journal, Toyoda had written an Op-Ed piece that really doesn’t do a very convincing job of explaining away Toyota’s too-slow handling of the brakes’ malfunction that has affected its Camry, Lexus and Prius lines.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704454304575081644051321722.html
Perhaps careful not to admit culpability, in light of the lawsuits Toyota faces from families of those killed when their cars suddenly accelerated, Toyoda’s piece was not very passionate, heart-felt or eloquent. You can read it and decide for yourself.
But that may be the least of Toyota’s woes. News broke Tuesday that a federal grand jury and the Securities and Exchange Commission had subpoenaed company documents, kicking off a criminal probe of the car maker’s attempts to deal with fatal problems with accelerator pedals, brakes and floor mats.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704454304575081363213478420.html?KEYWORDS=toyota+and+subpoena
Posted on 22nd February 2010 by Gordon Johnson in Uncategorized
brain injury attorney, brain injury lawyer, corporate manipulations of recalls, Sudden acceleration and Toyota, Toyota recall
Toyota, once reputed to be one of America’s most trusted auto brands, keeps digging itself deeper in trouble as more revelations come out about its bungling of its car recall. Hollywood couldn’t have scripted a bigger debacle for an auto maker. The debacle has taken many lives. Hopefully, those killed or injured during the sudden acceleration of their Camrys will ultimately get justice in courts. But if Toyota and other corporations don’t learn from these mistakes, they will just keep happening.
In the latest twist in the convoluted Toyota story, The New York Times wrote Monday that the Japanese auto maker figured it could save $100 million by getting lawmakers to agree to a limited recall for the 2007 Camry and Lexus ES cars.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/22/business/22toyota.html?hp
That recall was for the same issue that has plagued Toyotas now, namely accelerator pedals getting stuck and cars racing out of control.
The information about the limited recall, part of a presentation, was part of the documents subpoenaed by the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, according to The Times.
So far Toyota has recalled more than 8 million cars globally about the issue of accelerators getting stuck. The company has also stopped making and selling the vehicles with suspected accelerator problems.
The $100 million is savings figure was part of a confidential presentation that the president of Toyota’s North American operations, Yoshimi Inaba, made to his staff in Washington.
The car maker said it had gotten several favorable federal rulings regarding a 2007 recall of the Camry and Lexus ES 350 sedans for faulty accelerator pedals. Toyota boasted that by negotiating an equipment recall with the finding of a defect, the company saved $100 million. It also said it had delayed the imposition of federal safety rules impacting other models, saving it millions.
As it turns out, that $100 million savings may not have been such a bargain for Toyota.
