Personal Injury Law

Toyota recall update

By Ryan Bradley, Esq.

It seems that as each week goes by, another complaint is lodged with Toyota and another round of recalls is issued for a potentially dangerous design defect. The total number of vehicles affected by recalls has risen to 8.5 million. To put that in perspective, Toyota sells about 2.3 million vehicles in the U.S. every year. It appears news for the auto manufacturer is not getting much better as the U.S. government has asked the company to hand over recall documents at the same time as a flood of new complaints rolls in.

The Transportation Department has demanded that Toyota turn over documents relating to the recalls that would demonstrate when the company found out about the potential dangers. Officials are looking to see if the company delayed publicizing the news after learning about the potential flaws and dangerous mechanical failures. If the company knew about problems and failed to warn drivers causing more fatal car accidents, the company could face serious consequences.

Toyota's response to the Federal Government's demands must be received in 30 to 60 days or the company could face fines. The Transportation Department is already considering fining Toyota for its handling of the situation.

As the government continues to put pressure on Toyota, more and more complaints stream in from average citizens. According to some reports, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has received word of up to 34 fatalities in the past decade connected to rapid acceleration issues. Nearly a thousand new incident reports have come in since the recalls went public and officials expect the numbers to rise. It should be stressed that these reports have not been verified or investigated, but if they are accurate, they will be evidence that Toyota's problems are much larger than first suspected when the first recalls were issued last year.

As if all that wasn't enough, the company has just announced it will be looking into a new reported problem: defective power steering in their Corolla models.

Full post as published by Missouri Accident Lawyer Blog on February 16, 2010 (boomark / email).