"desertdog5051" (desertdog5051)
12/01/2014 at 12:22 • Filed to: None
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"desertdog5051" (desertdog5051)
12/01/2014 at 12:22 • Filed to: None | 1
| 11 |
Reading part of an Op-Ed written by one of the Toyota "unintended acceleration" recipients. He got his check for $20.91. Lawyers got their checks for $227 million. Why would anyone participate in these things? Not that I hate lawyers. Sometimes they are a necessary evil. But still evil. Lawyers like Steve Lehto probably do some actual good. My experience with lawyers is very limited but I have never thought I got my money's worth from them.You can read the article on Autoblog.
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For Sweden
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:23 |
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It's almost like the lawyers did all the work litigating the lawsuit.
sm70- why not Duesenberg?
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:25 |
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I'm all for those lawyers. We didn't pay a dime, were unaffected by the incident and sold our car prior to it, and still got a $20 check. You go, lawyers.
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desertdog5051
> For Sweden
12/01/2014 at 12:27 |
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More like "If we can convince a few thousand greedy people that there is free money for them, we can make millions. Just don't tell them they will get pennies."
macanamera
> For Sweden
12/01/2014 at 12:28 |
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No bro, everyone is evil and money is evil. Do you even internet?
FKA-RacecaR
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:31 |
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I did not even realize I was part of it, but received a check for $8.xx a couple weeks ago. Maybe that is where most people are with it.
HammerheadFistpunch
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:51 |
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Lawyers get a bad rep.
I mean, most of them deserve it, so I'm not sure what I'm saying here.
bhardoin
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:52 |
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Though a lot of the money went to the lawyers prosecuting, I think of class action lawsuits more as punishment for the accused than as help for the victim. In this case, it would be really difficult for a single person to bring Toyota to court because "one time my car didn't stop accelerating, and I ended up totally fine and it only did it once but it was kinda scary". But it's still an engineering mistake/oversight/neglect that should be discouraged, and I think class action lawsuits are one of the only ways to put a cost on those mistakes.
BJ
> For Sweden
12/01/2014 at 12:53 |
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They did the litigating on behalf of affected consumers who are - apparently - not getting a reasonable compensation for their troubles.
Is the system broken because the lawyers took too much or failed to negotiate a satisfactory settlement? Maybe they should have determined a payment amount per person, and not simply a lump sum to be shared amongst any and all comers.
Is the system broken because people who were not affected were allowed to participate, therefore diluting the payoff? Perhaps too many free riders signed up just looking for some quick cash.
Or is there something fundamentally wrong with how class action suits work?
Or maybe the entire lawsuit was frivolous because most of the unintended acceleration was caused by user error and now we're left wondering, just what was the point of this exercise?
jariten1781
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 12:55 |
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Well, the overall cost to Toyota was ~1.8 billion (the numbers differ in most articles but they hover between 1.6-1.8B). ~200M went to lawyers, ~900M to vehicle repair/upgrades, and ~750M to the checks for 'loss of value'. So the owners got around 90% of the payout in repairs or checks. A 10% lawyer fee isn't exorbitant.
tromoly
> desertdog5051
12/01/2014 at 13:07 |
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Years ago my parents got a check for $5 from one of those. To this day the check is uncashed.
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desertdog5051
> bhardoin
12/01/2014 at 13:16 |
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Good point.