Auto Safety

February 12, 2021

General Motors (GM) has agreed to a $5.75 million settlement with the State of California to resolve allegations of making false and misleading statements to investors, including the state’s largest pension system, California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS).  According to Attorney General Xavier Becerra, GM cheated California twice—first by failing to disclose a faulty ignition-switch issue to the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) that it had been aware of for almost ten years, and which ultimately led to 124 fatalities and 274 injuries, and second by concealing the problem from investors and failing to build reserves for losses it knew was coming.  The company’s actions artificially inflated its stock price, causing CalPERS to lose millions of dollars.  CA AG

November 27, 2020

Hyundai Motor America, Inc. and Kia Motors America, Inc. have entered into agreements with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration resolving claims that they were untimely in recalling over 1.6 million vehicles equipped with "Theta II" engines and provided inaccurate information to NHTSA regarding those recalls.  The companies are subject to combined penalties totaling $210 million, $140 million for Hyundai and $70 million for Kia.  NHTSA; See 2021 whistleblower reward

August 25, 2020

American Honda Motor Co., and Honda of America Mfg., Inc. (Honda) has reached a settlement with the Attorney Generals of 48 states and agreed to pay $85.1 million to resolve allegations of failing to disclose certain airbag safety failures to regulators and ­­­customers of Honda and Acura vehicles sold in the United States.  According to the complaint, Honda engineers were aware that the propellant used in Takata-manufactured airbags—used in Honda and Acura vehicles since 2001—could burn aggressively, cause the inflator to burst, and ultimately harm drivers and passengers, yet continued to represent that its cars were safe even as it began recalling affected vehicles in 2008.  Although the company eventually recalled approximately 12.9 million vehicles, the recalls came too late and the failures resulted in at least 14 deaths and over 200 injuries nationwide.  AG CA; AG FL; AG NY; AG GA

Takata - Auto Safety ($1 billion)

Constantine Cannon represented two whistleblowers in a submission under the Motor Vehicle Safety Whistleblower Act, alleging serious defects in Takata airbags which exploded and claimed the lives of 22 people and set off a worldwide recall of nearly 100 million airbag inflators.  In January 2017, Takata pled guilty to wire fraud and agreed to pay $1 billion in criminal penalties stemming from the company’s fraudulent conduct in relation to sales of defective airbag inflators.  The whistleblower awards our clients received in March 2018 were the first ever made under the Auto Safety Whistleblower Program.  Read more -- NPR, WSJ, Reuters, CC.

October 19, 2017

California announced a $120 million multistate settlement with General Motors Company (GM) over allegations that the company concealed safety issues related to defective ignition switches in GM vehicles. California will be receiving over $7 million. The settlement, reached among the attorneys general of 49 states and the District of Columbia and GM, concludes a multistate investigation into the auto manufacturer’s failure to disclose in a timely manner known safety defects associated with unintended key-rotation and/or ignition-switch related issues in several models and model years of GM vehicles. CA