TOYOTA never presented EXPERTS!
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Did anyone notice? They presented statements and a clown who contradicted videos he presented to the jury.
Instead of correcting TOYOTA DEFECTS....TOYOTA pays a gaggle of attorneys....
Toyota asks judge to overturn $10.9 million verdict in fatal Camry crash
- Article by: RANDY FURST , Star Tribune
- Updated: March 4, 2015 - 12:15 PM
Toyota Motor Co. is asking U.S. District Judge Ann Montgomery to overturn a $10.9 million award to the driver and victims of a 2006 accident, arguing the jury should not have found the company at fault.
In legal documents filed Tuesday, Toyota also said that Koua Fong Lee, the driver of a 1996 Toyota Camry, and his wife and family were not entitled to the money they were awarded for emotional damages, because their testimony about their distress after the crash that killed three people was not backed up by medical testimony.
“We sympathize with the families affected by this unfortunate accident in 2006,” Toyota said in a statement released Wednesday. “However, based on our close review of the record, we do not believe the verdict is supported by the testimony presented at trial from plaintiffs’ expert and other incident witnesses. In our view, the evidence clearly demonstrated that Mr. Lee’s 1996 Camry was well-designed and not the cause of this crash.”
Toyota’s legal arguments will form the basis of an almost certain appeal to the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, should Montgomery reject the request.
In a brief signed by Minneapolis attorney Bard Borkon, Toyota contends that Lee’s chief technical witness, John Stilson, failed to prove his contention that two pulleys under the hood in Lee’s Camry became overheated and stuck together, causing the car to accelerate even as Lee applied the brakes. The accident occurred as he was exiting eastbound Interstate 94 at Snelling Avenue in St. Paul on June 10, 2006.
The Camry slammed into the rear of a 1995 Oldsmobile Ciera parked at a traffic light, killing the Ciera’s driver and his son, severely injuring the driver’s daughter, who died 16 months later, and injuring two other relatives in the Ciera.
Toyota said that rather than using road-tests to show that the Camry overheated the pulleys, Stilson inappropriately tested his theory by aiming a hair dryer at the accelerator to simulate the heat. Toyota underscored that its own tests showed no overheating.
In legal documents filed Tuesday, Toyota also said that Koua Fong Lee, the driver of a 1996 Toyota Camry, and his wife and family were not entitled to the money they were awarded for emotional damages, because their testimony about their distress after the crash that killed three people was not backed up by medical testimony.
Toyota’s legal arguments will form the basis of an almost certain appeal to the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, should Montgomery reject the request.
Attorneys for Lee and the families will file their response later.
I heard testimonies from 11 others during Mr. Lee's Evidentiary Hearing in 2010 when he was freed and fully exonerated. All 11 said the exact same thing, the Camry took off on it's own and they could not get it to stop by only using the brakes. You can't build up vacuum pressure when your throttle is stuck open if you have ABS brakes. Who does Toyota think the jury and judge should believe? The 3 men who testified at the recent liability lawsuit (who had nothing to gain by testifying and were not paid one red cent to testify) or the people Toyota paid millions to for testifying. Bob Hilliard exposed during this liability lawsuit that Exponent was paid $42 million + from Toyota alone. In 2009 and again in 2011 - $31 million in payments from Toyota to Exponent. Bob also pointed out Exponent was the company who tested asbestos in brakes and claimed it was safe, Exponent tested a contaminant in drinking water and said it was safe (it was proven later to cause cancer), and Exponent did the Ford roof crush test and said it passed when later was found not to be safe. Seems like Exponent will say whatever their client wants them to say. "Expert" Lee Carr testified for Toyota - who showed a video of a 60 yr old woman who apparently was driving while they were video taping her. It was a split screen and you could see her feet in one corner, her hands on the steering wheel in another corner, and the road ahead through the windshield in another section of the video. Lee Carr said this woman had been "driving along" their course when they intentionally opened up her throttle to video tape her reaction. Well she started stepping on the gas pedal. BUT, Bob Hilliard played that video back during his closing argument and had the courtroom watch the video again. Funny thing is the odometer read only 1 mph on her vehicle - was she really driving? Lee Carr said this woman swerved in a zig zag motion in and out of some cones but during the reply in Bob's closing statement, we saw that her hands never moved the steering wheel at all - and we saw no cones on the course. Hmmmm Bob pointed out that Lee Carr and his partner Karl Stopchinski were paid $1.4 million for this case. I'd say they were a little overpaid. You know how much Bob Hilliard paid for his 2 independent engineers to conduct their tests? less than $65,000. I think I'll take the word of those who testified who had nothing to gain by testifying.
tbaltazar
tbaltazar
JUST MY OPINION...AT THE MOMENT!
If there was no defect, there would be no accident. Plain and simple.
They can file all they want. Stilson explained why he moved that tab - it was because the tab on the CC lever was sticking to the pulley and he said it wasn't supposed to do that. He showed the jury and the court room how rotating the tab (NOT cruise control lever itself) did not at all affect any function of the CC or accelerator and he demonstrated that. The 3 others who testified that the exact same thing happened in their 1996 Camry - let's see, one was flown back from Iraq during his 9 month tour as a pilot - he flies a black hawk and also flies for Sun Country Airlines. He's double trained on how to handle engine failures and engine problems. His '96 Camry was manufactured at the same factory as Mr. Lee's, in fact made on the same production line - made within minutes of Koua's Camry. This pilot testified he drove home one day going 45 mph without ever once having to step on the gas - he just kept shutting off his car to keep it from Exceeding 45 mph, and he said every time he would restart the car, the rpms spiked up to 5000 immediately - with both feet on the floor. That is a stuck throttle. If Toyota really wanted to prove that the upper plastic pulley isn't sticking against the metal bracket it's attached to, then they should have conducted some tests of their own. I saw no test results from them after the pulleys had been installed. The other 2 who testified that the same exact thing happened to their '96 Camry - one was a retired air force pilot who now volunteers for a VA hosp, one a former VP of Province College. One of them could only get their '96 Camry to slow down to 95 mph and that was with both feet on the brake pedal. You can't stop a car with ABS while the throttle is stuck open. It doesn't happen.
fred1goose
Interest1959
NO - I have had many toyotas over the years. Never again after the way they have treated these people.
How could an automaker whose cars have been killing and injuring people and in some cases putting people in prison for its runaway, out of control cars, could be asking the judge to overturn the verdict? What a despicable automaker Toyota is!!! It makes me sick to see Akio Toyoda and his executive getting away with murder.
JUST MY OPINION...AT THE MOMENT!
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