Automotive: Is Toyota Blaming Drivers For Acceleration Crashes

By Donald Griffith on July 14, 2010, 6:52 am

As if the allegations leveled against Toyota’s hybrid cars weren’t already interesting enough, a new wrinkle in the story promises to kick things up a notch.

Dept. Of Transportation

According to a story in the The Wall Street Journal, the Transportation Department has completed its reviews of dozens of in-car data recorders that were taken from the motor vehicles involved in the accidents which were blamed on the sudden and uncontrollable acceleration of Toyota (NYSE:TM) vehicles and concluded that the throttles were open and brakes were not engaged during the crashes. These results lead one to believe that the accidents were caused by human error. However, these findings in no way exonerate Toyota from the problems that have been caused by their sticking accelerator pedals or their floor mats that hold the accelerator pedals down to the floorboard.

NHTSA

The NHTSA has yet to brief any of Toyota’s executives on their findings. But, these findings do back-up the results of Toyota’s in-house tests according to Toyota Motor Sales’ Chief Spokesman Mike Michels. He went on to say that the information download downloaded from the event data recorders in the cars found evidence to support the idea that the sticky pedals, pedal entrapment, and driver error all played parts in the suspicious accidents.

 

Litigation

A federal court in Santa Ana, California is already working through the litigation of an enormous class action lawsuit against the automaker. Attorneys say that Toyota still needs to submit tens of thousands of documents over to the court. These sensitive materials include the engineering notes that document what Toyota knew about the problems in the electronic throttle system and when they knew it. The expected compensation in the civil case is estimated at over five-hundred million dollars.

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