Toyota Will Have to Face Acceleration Claims, Judge Says
Posted by: Auto Buff / Category: ToyotaApril 29, 2011, 9:51 PM EDT
By Margaret Cronin Fisk and Bill Callahan
(Updates with Toyota’s statement in eighth paragraph.)
April 29 (Bloomberg) — A federal judge overseeing lawsuits against Toyota Motor Corp. said the automaker will have to face economic loss claims over unintended acceleration allegations.
Toyota owners claimed the company failed to disclose or fix defects related to sudden acceleration, driving down the value of their vehicles. U.S. District Judge James V. Selna in Santa Ana, California, said the claims could go forward because vehicle owners met court standards on pleading loss or injury.
“Taking these allegations as true, as the court must at the pleading stage, they establish an economic loss,” Selna wrote in his tentative decision yesterday. “A vehicle with a defect is worth less than one without a defect.”
In court today, Selna told lawyers he wanted to review some aspects of his tentative ruling before making it final. He added, “The tentative, in essence, will be the ruling of the court.”
Toyota, the world’s largest automaker, recalled millions of U.S. vehicles, starting in 2009, after claims of defects and incidents involving sudden unintended acceleration. The recalls set off a wave of litigation, including hundreds of economic loss suits and claims by individuals or their families for injuries and deaths caused by such incidents.
Most of the federal lawsuits were combined before Selna, who is overseeing pre-trial evidence-gathering, or discovery. Selna issued a similar ruling in November rejecting Toyota’s motion to dismiss an earlier complaint by the vehicle owners.
Appeal Suggested
Yesterday’s tentative finding followed an amended complaint by the plaintiffs and a subsequent renewed motion to dismiss. Selna told lawyers at today’s hearing to consider asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to review his ruling on whether the plaintiffs have presented enough evidence to allow their cases to go forward.
“Toyota is pleased that Judge Selna today invited the parties to seek consideration from the ninth circuit on key rulings that could have a significant impact on the case,” Celeste Migliore, a spokeswoman for the Toyota City, Japan-based company, said in an e-mailed statement. “The rulings at issue relate to which plaintiffs have properly presented claims under the U.S. Constitution and California statutes.”
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