PHILADELPHIA, TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 2007
THE OLDEST LAW JOURNAL IN THE UNITED STATES
Philadelphia Lawsuit Could Prompt National Tire Recall
BY GINA PASSARELLA wrapped around the axle, causing the driver to said.
Of the Legal Staff lose control of the van, Killino said. When Foreign Tire Sales first did tests on
“They’re trying to save pennies, and instead Hangzhou Zhongce’s tires, they held up at
W
hen Woloshin & Killino signed on they cost lives,” he said of the Chinese manu- 40,000 miles, he said. The tests were repeated
to represent victims of a fatal car facturer. this year after the lawsuit was filed and they
accident, they initiated a nine- Foreign Tire Sales, as the distributor, is were having problems at 25,000 miles, he said.
month investigation into what caused the driver responsible for having a recall remedy, accord- Without any cooperation from Hangzhou
of the van to lose control, killing two of the pas- ing to Safety Research & Strategies President Zhongce, Lavigne said his client has no way of
sengers and seriously injuring the third. Sean E. Kane. But according to the report filed knowing “from when to when the tires were
After determining that it was defective tires with the NHTSA, the company said it had no being manufactured like this.”
that caused the operator to lose control of his remedy and would face bankruptcy if it had to Besides Foreign Tire Sales, there are at least
work van while driving on Pennsylvania Route endure the cost of a national recall. six other distributors of Hangzhou Zhongce tires
476, Jeffrey B. Killino filed a lawsuit in So Foreign Tire Sales is looking to the manu- in the United States, the attorneys involved in
Philadelphia against the manufacturer and dis- facturer to foot the bill. The Union, N.J., com- the case have said. That could put the number of
tributors of the tires as well as the van manufac- pany has filed an $80 million federal lawsuit in defective tires over a million, Killino said.
turer, General Motors. New Jersey against Hangzhou Rubber Co. “This may be just the tip of the iceberg,”
It has been nearly two months since the 330- According to Killino, neither he nor Foreign Kane said.
page complaint in McCulley v. General Motors Tire Sales has heard from the Chinese manufac- Kane and his company were involved with
was filed on behalf of the estates of passengers turer. the Firestone/Ford Explorer tire debacle and
Rafael B. Melo and Claudeir Jose Figueiredo “They’re brazen,” he said. “They’re not doing have experience in tire safety. Killino called him
and seriously injured passenger Carlos Souza. anything.” when first investigating the McCulley case and
The driver is not a party to the lawsuit and was The distributor stopped buying tires from the the two have now petitioned the NHTSA to
not seriously injured, Killino said. company in June 2006, according to Foreign issue a consumer advisory alerting the public to
In that time, one of the defendants, distributor Tire Sales attorney, Lawrence N. Lavigne of the potential hazards of these tires.
Foreign Tire Sales, has written a noncompliance Norris McLaughlin & Marcus in Bridgewater, Kane said this is just one more example of
report to the National Highway Traffic Safety N.J. defective Chinese products causing safety con-
Administration (NHTSA) alerting them to safe- Lavigne said Foreign Tire Sales has fewer cerns in the United States. He said this lawsuit
ty breaches by Chinese manufacturer Hangzhou than 10 employees and “just financially can’t points not only to the fact that consumers should
Zhongce Rubber Co., another defendant in handle a recall.” He said he is trying to get the be warned about the tires, but that the United
McCulley. Chinese manufacturer to do the right thing and States may want to re-examine procedures for
Now, attorneys involved in the case have said come to the United States to face this suit. recalls of defective products.
that a mass recall is likely. “FTS is as much of a victim here as anybody An example, he said, would be to require dis-
In a copy of the report — which has yet to be else,” Lavigne said. tributors to post bond to ensure they can handle
made public — shown to The Legal, Foreign After several requests to Hangzhou Zhongce a recall if need be.
Tire Sales told the NHTSA that tests of the tires by Foreign Tire Sales, the manufacturer finally “It really highlights a crack in the system,”
in 2001 demonstrated safety compliance, but by admitted that it had reduced or omitted the gum Kane said, adding later “There’s not enough
2005 reported problems with the tires had dra- strip from an unspecified number of tires, enforcement in the U.S. on these Chinese tires.”
matically increased. Lavigne said. Killino said his lawsuit could have potential-
Foreign Tire Sales told the NHTSA in the There were about 444,000 tires purchased by ly saved lives by spawning requests for a recall
June 11 report that Hangzhou Zhongce had Foreign Tire Sales from Hangzhou Zhongce, so of the tires.
removed gum strips from the tires, and Foreign the $80 million is a rough estimate of what a “A private lawsuit here in Philadelphia had
Tire Sales had known of this since at least recall of those tires would cost, Lavigne said. served a public benefit,” he said.
September 2006. According to Killino, gum That number would most likely go down, how- The tires in question have been sold under
strips help keep the tread from pulling away ever, because the company isn’t sure that all of the names Westlake, Telluride, Compass and
from the belt of the tire. In the accident that those tires were missing gum strips and some of YKS, and are known as steel-belted, light-
prompted this suit, the tread came loose and those tires are already out of commission, he truck tires. •
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