Phoenix Police Officer Jason Schechterle is lucky to be alive, no thanks to the Ford Motor Company. The Ford police car he was driving burst into flames after he was hit from behind by a taxicab.
Ford knew at least since 1999, that the Crown Victoria Police Interceptor had a defective fuel tank but didn’t warn Officer Schechterle or thousands of other police throughout the nation. Due to class action litigation and the discovery of internal documents, the truth has been revealed and Ford has been held accountable.
Case Study – Ford Motor Company
Late on the evening of March 26, 2001, Officer Schechterle was driving his Ford Crown Victoria police cruiser when a taxicab slammed into him from behind. The patrol car’s fuel tank punctured and ignited on impact, sending flames more than 20 feet into the air. His fellow officers saved his life at the last minute, peeling Jason from his smoking, smoldering seat. Officer Schechterle’s head and hands were charred to the bone with fifth degree burns. Two fingers on his left hand were amputated. He was given last rites and lay in a drug-induced sleep for nearly three months.
Today, after undergoing more than 30 surgical procedures and continuing cosmetic surgery, Officer Schechterle has recovered. He’s still working for the Phoenix police department and he’s gone to court to hold Ford Motor Company accountable.
Ford’s Explosive Secret
Since 1992, at least 14 police officers, and as many as 30, have died in Ford Crown Victoria police cruiser fuel-fed fires. Four died in 2002 alone. Officer Schechterle’s law suit – and dozens of class action law suits filed by cities and counties around the nation – claims the Crown Victoria Police Interceptor (CVPI) is patently unsafe due to the location of the car's fuel tank – behind the rear axle within the car's "crush zone." This location makes the car’s fuel tank vulnerable to failure in high-speed crashes, resulting in gasoline leaks and explosions. [For more information, go to www.crownvictoriasafetyalert.com and http://www.autosafety.org]
Ford Stonewalls and Denies Fault
Ford Motor Company has been aware of catastrophic fires caused by fuel tank ruptures in rear-end collisions since at least mid-1999. Police organizations and investigative news reporters uncovered the defect and pushed Ford to admit the problem and fix it. But Ford continued to claim the car was safe and blamed high speeds for the fire deaths, saying no fuel tank can protect against impacts of 70 mph or higher. [See Detroit Free Press investigative series of articles at www.crownvictoriasafetyalert.com]
At the same time, Ford conducted internal studies showing the rate of rear-end collision fire deaths for CVPIs was almost 140% higher than for the competitive GM line and about double the rate for Ford’s much smaller Escort line. [See chart at http://www.crownvictoriasafetyalert.com/Statistics.html]
In October 2001, Ford issued a Technical Service Bulletin (TSB) to its dealers recommending steps they should take to reduce punctures. But they did not even notify the law enforcement agencies that owned the vehicles or the public about the problem or its TSB. In September 2002 and early 2003, Ford made other recommendations for reducing fuel tank punctures – a system of shields covering more components that could lead to fuel tank punctures in high-speed crashes and trunk liners for police departments. The City of Dallas ran crash tests of CVPIs in July 2003 and discovered that while the trunk liners prevented some punctures, they created a new potentially dangerous problem – the massive splitting of fuel tanks.
Ford Made Misleading Claims About Crash Test
In November 2003, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) upped the rear crash standard from 30 to 50 mph to reflect the new reality of U.S. road travel. When the Ford police car controversy became public, the company began making false claims about safety improvements and safety tests it had conducted to make the CVPI safer for law enforcement.
The most egregious is a claim last fall that a CVPI equipped with Ford's shield retrofit and new trunk liner now meets a 75 mph rear crash standard. In a marketing piece, Ford said police car purchasers should challenge all Ford competitors to meet this same standard.
But the truth is that Ford never tested a CVPI equipped with a trunk pack liner and fuel tank shields to a 75 mph fuel integrity crash standard. This was discovered only recently in deposition testimony taken as part of dozens of class action lawsuits against Ford that have been consolidated for discovery purposes before a federal court in Cleveland. [See excerpts from April 30, 2003 deposition of Ford representative – see pp 12 and 15]
Ford also announced that the Ford CVPI passed a crash test conducted in August 2002, meeting a NHTSA limit on fuel leakage of less than one ounce of fuel. In reality, as revealed in an internal report and acknowledged by Ford officials in deposition testimony, the CVPI in this test leaked more than 40 ounces of synthetic fuel. [See excerpts from February 3, 2003 deposition of Ford representative – see highlighted sections.]
Information Discovered in Class Action Lawsuits
Ford has been unable to ignore or dismiss completely the concerns of law enforcement agencies about the safety of the CVPI in large part because of information brought to light in the class action lawsuit discovery process.
As noted above, internal Ford documents and sworn testimony given as part of dozens of class action lawsuits against Ford Motor Company revealed:
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Ford had done nothing to prepare for, perform, or plan high speed testing at 75 mph, even though a commitment to do so had been made to the then Attorney General of Arizona by the Ford Motor Vice President, Environmental and Safety Engineering.
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The CVPI greatly exceeded the NHTSA limit on fuel leakage of less than one ounce of fuel in a crash test – despite Ford’s public claims that it met the NHTSA limit.
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Ford’s own statistics revealed that Crown Victoria Police Interceptors have a rate of fatal collision fuel fed fires far higher than other vehicles.
The discovery process in class action lawsuits requires corporations, such as Ford, to provide internal documents and sworn testimony that provide a behind-the-scenes look at corporate practices and products. Without this process, today’s CVPIs would be no safer than those manufactured in 1979.
Ford is one of the many American corporations that would benefit from class action proposals now in Congress - proposals that would make it more difficult to have access to this type of information and allow for stronger enforcement of consumer protection, civil rights, health, safety and environmental laws. [For more information about class action visit USAction.]
For more information contact Helen Gonzales at 202-624-1730.
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