Jury Orders GM to Pay Couple $33 Million Over Death of Son
A Florida jury ruled on Monday that General Motors Corp. must pay $33 million in damages to a couple who sued the auto maker over the death of their 13-year-old son in a 1991 accident.
The Broward County Circuit Court jury awarded no punitive damages in the wrongful-death suit, filed by Constance and Robert McGee of Pembroke Pines, Fla., over the death of their son Shane in a car fire.
The jury had awarded the family $60 million in compensatory damages, finding GM 55% responsible for the accident, and therefore liable for the $33-million payment. Punitive damages could have been astronomical.
The McGees’ 1983 Oldsmobile Cutlass station wagon was idling at a toll booth on a Virginia highway on July 13, 1991, when a trailer broke loose from a pickup truck being driven by Curtis Cayton several lanes away. The trailer rolled under the station wagon, leading to a fire that engulfed the car.
The McGees’ attorney, Sheldon Schlesinger, argued during the six-month trial that the accident could have been prevented if GM had built the car with a simple gas tank shield, which it considered adding but rejected.
The McGees had sought $81 million in compensatory damages and an unspecified amount of punitive damages. The family scheduled a news conference today to discuss the case.
Cayton was found 45% responsible. But under Florida law, if only one of two potential defendants is sued, the one brought to court is not responsible for the other’s portion of fault. Cayton was previously sued in Virginia, and his insurer settled that case for an undisclosed amount.
GM said it would appeal the judgment.
“While our sympathies go out to the victims and families of this freak accident, another driver’s negligence was responsible for this tragedy,” the car maker said in a statement.
“GM believes the jury was obscured in their analysis by improper evidentiary rulings throughout the trial,” it said.
Schlesinger said he felt there should have been punitive damages, but that he was pleased with the award.
Attorneys for GM defended the Oldsmobile station wagon as a safe vehicle and argued that Cayton, driver of the pickup truck pulling the 1,300-pound trailer, was responsible for the accident. Jury forewoman Cynthia Erickson said no single piece of evidence swayed the panel, but she called the evidence “overwhelming.”
The largest known jury verdict against an auto maker involving vehicle fires was $125 million in damages against Ford Motor Co. in the early 1980s for design defects in the Ford Pinto that made it prone to fires in rear-end crashes.
