Wednesday, April 2, 2014

More problems for GM and other news

As its CEO went before Congress to testify about problems with defective ignition switches that have already led to the recall of 2.6 million cars worldwide, General Motors announced that another 1.3 million vehicles are being recalled due to power steering problems.  Go here for the full story.

Meanwhile, as part of the investigation into the deaths allegedly caused by defects in General Motors cars, the House committee on energy and commerce found that the company was aware of the dangerous defects as early as 2001 (see here) and that federal safety regulators were suspicious about potential problems as far back as 2007. That story is here.

And then, there is the news that GM CEO Mary Barra announced that the company has hired and would soon be meeting with “special master of disaster” Ken Feinberg, to help them evaluate the situation.   As explained by The PopTort, "[s]ince 9/11, Mr. Feinberg has been the “go to” guy to divvy up money to victims in two situations: 1. victims harmed by large events, who have no recourse in the courts (as for the 9/11 victims); and, 2. victims harmed by extremely negligent companies, who are facing large numbers of claims and who want to stop or weaken lawsuits (as in BP’s Gulf Coast disaster.) GM now finds itself in both camps. So watch closely what GM and Mr. Feinberg do next."  The PopTort's comment on this can be found here.

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