Fiat Chrysler, Dodge Ram drivers seek approval of truck defect settlement

Update: 

• Fiat Chrysler and a group of Dodge Ram drivers have asked a Michigan federal judge to preliminarily approve a class settlement resolving claims that certain 2014-2019 Dodge Ram 1500 EcoDiesel trucks have a defect that can cause engine fires.
• Under the proposed deal, FCA US LLC will extend warranties, reimburse out-of-pocket repair costs and pay $3,000 to owners whose vehicles caught fire due to allegedly faulty exhaust gas recirculation coolers.
• Plaintiffs allege FCA knew about the defect for years before issuing a recall and that some owners experienced delays in receiving promised repairs.
• The Dodge Ram class action settlement was reached after mediation and extensive negotiations. If approved, the settlement agreement would also provide $5,000 payments to class representatives.

Several people who say their pickup trucks spontaneously caught fire – including one whose windshield exploded during the blaze – are suing the manufacturer over what they say is a dangerous and defective vehicle.

Four owners filed a class action lawsuit against FCA US, formerly known as the Chrysler Group, in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan on August 27. They claim the company knew about the problems with its Dodge Ram 1500 and 1500 Classic trucks equipped with the 3.0L EcoDiesel engine, but didn’t do enough to address them. As a result, the plaintiffs said, the automaker violated consumer protection laws and concealed the defect.

Owners: Ram Trucks Catching Fire Due to Defective Components

The pickups involved in the class action were manufactured between 2014 and 2019.

According to the class action lawsuit, the trucks’ exhaust gas recirculation cooler or EGR is “grossly defective” and has led to sudden engine power loss and catastrophic fires. In the case of some of the plaintiffs, drivers and occupants were lucky to have gotten out of their trucks before the fires spread.

FCA sold more than 100,000 trucks with the faulty cooler, and issued a voluntary recall of them in late 2019, but the plaintiffs claim it made misrepresentations in the recall and some customers were denied a fix, a report on the lawsuit by MotorBiscuit.com said.

The lead plaintiffs, Bradley C. of Hawaii, Derek G. of Kansas, Hank V. of California and Leroy M. of Idaho want to represent a nationwide class of customers who bought or leased one of the Ram trucks catching fire. They suspect there could be thousands of Class Members who were affected by the Dodge defect.

Plaintiffs Tell of Fires, Frustration

Each of the four lead plaintiffs say they had significant problems with their Dodge Ram 1500, but Derek’s reported experience is the most dramatic. According to the class action lawsuit, he brought his 2016 truck to a local Dodge dealership in August 2019 “for the specific purpose of having the EGR system checked” because it was losing coolant and having acceleration problems. A month later he got the vehicle back, but the service department did not check the EGR, he says.

Three days later, while driving to work, the check engine light came on, then another indicator light, then Griesel lost acceleration and power, the lawsuit says. He coasted to the side of the road and when he got out of the truck, saw smoke coming from under the hood.

After popping the hood and seeing a fire burning in the area of the EGR, he got back inside the truck and put it in neutral to roll further away from a nearby group home he had stopped next to.

“He had barely gotten back out when the engine bay became fully engulfed in flames,” the lawsuit says. While waiting for firefighters to arrive, the windshield exploded out of the truck “sending shards of glass everywhere.”

“The sunroof, side windows, rear side windows, and rear windshield then shattered,” the class action lawsuit says. “The entire truck was on fire.”

The lawsuit includes photos of the truck on fire, and of the scorched wreckage.

FCA later said after investigating it could not determine a defect of the EGR caused the fire, a report by Business Insider said, and would only pay for his vehicle towing costs

Crawford owned another of the Ram trucks catching fire. Plaintiffs Hank and Leroy both said they were notified about the recalls on their Ram trucks, but when they tried numerous times to arrange to have the recall address and trucks fixed, their local dealerships said the parts weren’t available.

The Ram Trucks Catching Fire Class Action Lawsuit is Bradley Crawford, et al. v. FCA US, et al., Case No. 2:20-cv-12341 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan

This article is not legal advice. It is presented
for informational purposes only.