The GM ignition switch recall program to compensate victims continues to receive claims for injuries and deaths allegedly linked to the ignition switch defect.

The latest tally of GM defective ignition switch recall claims received stands at 2,215, including 229 death claims; 142 “Category One” injury claims, or those resulting in quadriplegia, paraplegia, double amputation, permanent brain damage or pervasive burns; and 1,844 “Category Two” injury claims, or injuries that required a hospital visit within 48 hours of an accident. To date, there have been 80 claims determined eligible, including the 36 death claims, as well as five Category One injury claims and 39 Category Two claims.

Attorney Kenneth Feinberg, who was hired by GM to compensate victims, and his staff have an organized procedure on how to deal with the GM defective ignition switch claims submitted to the compensation fund. So far, Feinberg’s office has made 61 offers to individuals affected by the GM ignition switch recall and has yet to reject any claims. Multiple claims are still under review.

The deadline for filing a compensation claim has been extended to January 31, 2015. The amount of compensation has not been capped but GM has estimated that compensating all victims of the defective car part could cost the Detroit automaker anywhere from $400-600 million.

The GM Ignition Switch Recall

In February 2014, General Motors recalled 1.6 million vehicles because of an ignition switch defect that has been linked to the deaths of 13 people. The GM recall includes the 2005-2010 Chevrolet Cobalt, 2007-2010 Pontiac G5, 2003-2007 Saturn Ion, 2006-2011 Chevrolet HHR, 2006-2010 Pontiac Solstice and 2007-2010 Saturn Sky vehicles. The recall targeted a flaw that allowed an ignition switch to move out of the “run” position — and was found to cause air bags to fail to deploy during a crash. It was later announced GM actually knew of the problem since 2004 and in March 2014, a class action lawsuit was filed alleging General Motors excluded vehicles from the GM ignition switch recall and put consumers at risk.

GM Lawsuits

Since June, all claims filed against General Motors throughout the federal court system have been consolidated for pretrial proceedings in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, as part of a multidistrict litigation, or MDL.

The cases are centralized before U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman to reduce duplicative discovery into common issues, avoid conflicting pretrial rulings and to serve the convenience of the parties, witnesses and the courts. Judge Furman has also set a bellwether process for the preparation of some of the GM recall injury class action lawsuits with the first case expected to go before a federal jury in January 2016.