Toyota: With all due respect, we don’t believe James Sikes

You know the story of James Sikes, the guy whose Prius zoomed up to 94 mph because of unintended acceleration, and the California Highway Patrol eventually had to help him get it stopped?  Well, that’s not looking like such a good story.

Toyota released its preliminary, witnessed-by-the-NHTSA findings today, and they’re basically calling Sikes a liar:

While a final report is not yet complete, there are strong indications that the driver’s account of the event is inconsistent with the findings of the preliminary analysis.

The investigation revealed no defect with any component on the car, and found acute front brake wear consistent with repeated on-off applications of the brakes, not the continuous hard application the driver claimed.

Guess what else?  If there is a systematic problem in Toyotas, the problem discriminates against older people.  In a list the Los Angeles Times has compiled of 56 fatalities over 19 years involving unintended acceleration in Toyota products, the median driver age is a whopping 60 years old.

Remember Audi’s unintended acceleration fiasco?  That was ultimately found to be “pedal misapplication”; stepping on the accelerator instead of the brake pedal.  (In other words, driver error.)  I think we’re headed for the same thing with Toyota, but with a much quicker recovery.

Frankly, it’s difficult to look at the number of reported problems versus Toyota’s volume and see statistical significance.

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