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$105 Million Verdict Against DaimlerChrysler in Minivan Baby Death

December 1, 2004
A Tennessee jury found a baby's 2001 death was caused by a faulty minivan seat and hit DaimlerChrysler Corp. with a $105 million verdict.

It's one of four recent cases against DaimlerChrysler targeting minivan seat backs that collapsed during collisions, injuring or killing passengers. Two cases were settled out of court and one is awaiting trial in Florida.

Testifying in the three-week trial in Nashville, a Chrysler manager testified that the automaker knew the seats in its minivans were unsafe and colluded with a federal regulatory agency to cover up the information.

DaimlerChrysler says it will appeal, claiming that the crash that led to 8-month-old Joshua Flax's death was caused by the reckless driver who rear-ended the van, not a flaw in the design of the Dodge Grand Caravan. It called the verdict "grossly excessive, unconstitutional, and a miscarriage of justice."

The Tennessee case went to trial because the baby's parents, Jeremy Flax and Rachel Sparkman, wanted to "get the word out," attorney George W. Fryhofer III said.

"They wanted to be sure no more parents had to watch their own kids killed or brain-damaged by these defects," Fryhofer said.

Throughout the trial, the parents' attorneys accused DaimlerChrysler of a cover-up of "hundreds of other similar incidents" involving seat back collapses that resulted in in passenger injury or death, even while it continued to market its Chrysler Town and Country minivan, Plymouth Voyager, and Dodge Caravan as safe, family-friendly vehicles.

The automaker has sold more than seven million minivans.

The backward collapse of front seat backs in the minivans during rear-end collisions would propel the drivers and front-seat passengers backward in a rear-end collision, often causing their heads to collide with children riding in the middle seat. That is what happened to 8-month-old Joshua Flax when a driver slammed into the back of the baby's grandparents' minivan at 70 mph in 2001 in Nashville, attorneys said.

The baby's skull was fractured and he died the next day.

"This has been a defect that has been brain-damaging and killing children in the family minivans for years," Fryhofer said.

Testimony during the Tennessee trial revealed that the automaker has sealed court records of an undisclosed number of suits involving failed minivan seat backs.

Testimony from experts at the trial, among them former Chrysler manager Paul V. Sheridan, showed that minivan seats collapsed in every rear impact test the automaker conducted.

In 1992, Sheridan was named to head a "Minivan Safety Leadership Team." The team concluded that the collapsing seatbacks needed to be redesigned. But Chrysler disbanded the team and, a month later, fired Sheridan, testimony indicated.

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