Round Up: Toyota Plants False "Driver Error" Story

Brett Emison

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To borrow a phrase from our friends at overlawyered... I told you so.

Toyota has been caught planting a story and misleading the public... again.

After doing just a little bit of homework, the media is catching on that they were (at least for a day or two) fooled by Toyota's PR games.

From Autoevolution:

According to just-auto.com, citing an unnamed NHTSA spokeswoman in Washington, the story had been made up by the Toyota PR machine and, even more, the NHTSA knew the story would be run.

"That story was planted by Toyota," the spokeswoman told just-auto.com. "Toyota is the source - yes we know that for definite. It is the Toyota PR machine. We knew they were going to put it out."

• Toyota Planted Driver's Fault Story [at autoevolution]
• Toyota "planted" driver error story [by Simon Warburton at just-auto.com]
• Report: WSJ unintended acceleration story "planted" by Toyota [by Damon Lavrinc at autoblog.com]
• Did Toyota Plant DOT Driver Error Story? [by Mike Magrath at Edmunds Inside Line via toyotalinks.com and zimbio.com]
• Toyota Planted Drivers' Fault Story [at The Real Timer]
• Did Toyota Plant a Story Blaming the Great Recall on Driver Error? [by Matthew DeBord at The Big Money from Slate]

So, to paraphrase Ted Frank at overlawyered, will Toyota apologists who have been blindly defending Toyota in the face of corporate malfeasance second only to BP apologize the families of the hundreds of people killed by Toyota sudden acceleration? As he said... Don't count on it.

Update (1): More coverage:

• Toyota Planted the "Driver Error" Story In The WSJ [by Meg Marco at the Consumerist]
• Report: Toyota Planted False NHTSA Info [by Drew Johnson at Left Lane News]
• Wall Street Journal Article "Planted" by Toyota?! [at MotorTrend Forum]

Update (2): Ted Frank accused me of lying and attacking him in this post (he didn't bother to leave a comment here, but posted at another site). I've responded to Ted here.