Since the summer of 2017, five California juries have found that Ford Motor Company’s officers and directors acted with malice, oppression and fraud in refusing to disclose known safety defects in Ford Super Duty trucks.
In each of the cases below, the jury found that Ford had concealed known safety defects with the malicious intent of persuading consumers to purchase defective vehicles, thereby committing fraud and violating California’s Consumer Legal Remedies Act (a California law intended to protect consumers from unfair trade practices). As a result of this misconduct, Ford was ordered to pay the following:
- On July 6, 2017, Charles Margeson was awarded $1.4 million in his case against Ford.
- On July 18, 2018, Leonard Coon was awarded $2.8 million in his case against Ford.
- On October 20, 2018, Valerie and Robert Brown were awarded $1.9 million in their case against Ford.
- On October 31, 2018, Shelby and Tammy Anderson were awarded $227,715 in their case against Ford.
- On December 20, 2018, Jerry and Shawn Nolan were awarded $8.1 million in their case against Ford.
The juries in these matters were presented with numerous internal communications between Ford’s directors, managers and supervisors, including an email in which the Warranty Program Supervisor admitted that Ford had exceeded its own cylinder pressure specifications in normally performing engines. He also advised that repeated engine failure should not be covered under the warranty and then requested all emails regarding this matter be deleted to avoid the risk of a class action lawsuit being filed against Ford.
The juries were also presented with PowerPoint presentations created by Ford which evidenced the company’s culture of hiding this type of information from consumers. One of these internal presentations stated that Ford’s goal was to protect the brand image of the F-Series and Power Stroke, despite quality concerns, customer issues and negative media coverage. Each of the juries in these respective cases ultimately found that it was Ford’s intention to be deceitful.
Knight Law Group, LLP represented each of the plaintiffs in their individual cases against Ford Motor Company.