GM documents sway jury for plaintiff in Missouri sudden-acceleration case.

A recent sudden-acceleration case in Missouri ended with an atypical verdict: The jury returned with a finding for the plaintiff, Connie Peters, who sued General Motors (GM) for strict liability, negligence, design defect, and failure to warn. The jury awarded compensatory and punitive damages. (No. 01CV205917 (Mo., Jackson County Cir. Ct. Dec. 19, 2002).)

Plaintiff attorneys say these claims are difficult to win, but Peters's lawyer, Mark Evans of Lexington, Missouri, called on witnesses to previous sudden-acceleration incidents, which added to the legal arsenal typically deployed in such cases.

On September 26, 2000, Peters, 59, got into her 1993 Oldsmobile Cutlass, put it in reverse, and rocketed 120 feet across the street, through her neighbor's yard and into a tree. The car then crossed the street again, this time traveling 95 feet up a hill before finally coming to rest atop some landscape timbers. The impact with the tree had amputated Peters's arm, and she suffered multiple skull fractures that left her in a persistent vegetative state.

Peters's lawsuit alleged that the Cutlass was susceptible to electrical signals within the car that could inadvertently activate the cruise control, which would, in turn, activate the throttle. The suit claimed there would have been no evidence of these signals.

Evans's ace in the hole, a former GM engineer, testified in a deposition that such a scenario was indeed likely in 1993 Cutlasses. The engineer had suggested a design refinement that would have eliminated this flaw. GM documents--obtained during what Evans described as a "difficult" discovery--refer to the possible occurrence of a "single electrical fault," which they did not explicitly identify. The engineer testified that the fault in question was sudden acceleration.

GM admitted that such a fault might exist, but contended that there would have been evidence of an electrical short if an electrical impulse had activated the cruise control.

GM raised a defense typical in sudden-acceleration cases, claiming that driver error caused the accident: Peters must have depressed the accelerator rather than the brake. Evans countered with testimony from Peters's treating neurosurgeon, who said that even if Peters had initially hit the accelerator, the effects of the impact with the tree made it impossible for her to have maintained enough pressure on the pedal for the car to have crossed the street a second time.

Evans said that testimony from victims and witnesses of similar crashes convinced the jury that the sudden-acceleration problem was real, even without physical evidence. Several witnesses testified that they had seen similar incidents during which a car's brake lights were clearly on, indicating that the driver was applying the brakes while the car was accelerating.