A US jury has returned a US$1.7 billion ($2.48 billion) verdict in opposition to Ford Motor Co. involving a automobile crash that claimed the lives of a Georgia couple, their attorneys confirmed.
Jurors in Gwinnett County, simply northeast of Atlanta, Georgia, returned the decision late final week within the years-long civil case involving what the plaintiffs' attorneys referred to as dangerously faulty roofs on Ford pickup vans (which in Australia could be referred to as a utility or ute), lawyer James Butler Jr confirmed right now.
Melvin and Voncile Hill had been killed in April 2014 within the rollover wreck of their 2002 Ford F-250. Their kids Kim and Adam Hill had been the plaintiffs within the wrongful demise case.
"I used to purchase Ford vans," Butler mentioned on Sunday native time.
"I believed no person would promote a truck with a roof this weak. The rattling factor is ineffective in a wreck. You would possibly as effectively drive a convertible."
Ford didn't instantly reply to requests for remark. However in closing arguments, attorneys employed by the corporate defended the actions of Ford and its engineers.
The Michigan-based automaker sought to defend the corporate in opposition to accusations "that Ford and its engineers acted willfully and wantonly, with a acutely aware indifference for the protection of the individuals who journey of their vehicles after they made these selections about roof power," protection lawyer William Withrow Jr mentioned in his closing arguments, in response to a courtroom transcript.
The allegation that Ford was irresponsible and willfully made selections that put clients in danger is "merely not the case," one other defence lawyer, Paul Malek, mentioned in the identical closing argument.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs had submitted proof of practically 80 related rollover wrecks that concerned truck roofs being crushed that injured or killed motorists, Butler's regulation agency, Butler Prather LLP, mentioned in an announcement.
"Extra deaths and extreme accidents are sure as a result of tens of millions of those vans are on the highway," Butler's co-counsel, Gerald Davidson, mentioned within the assertion.
"An award of punitive damages to hopefully warn individuals using round within the tens of millions of these vans Ford offered was the explanation the Hill household insisted on a verdict," Butler mentioned.
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