Plaintiffs Fight Back in Mercedes Gas Tank Defect Class Action

Plaintiffs hit back at a German car maker’s motion for summary judgment in a Mercedes-Benz E-Class gas tank defect class action lawsuit, arguing that the company knowingly hid defects regardless of their ownership status.

Mercedes-Benz USA had argued that each of the plaintiffs who had bought MY 2003-2009 E-class vehicles did so from third-party sellers. As a result, the automaker cited case law noting that it would be impractical, if not impossible, to attempt to notify secondhand owners of any such problems with the vehicle, in this case allegedly faulty gaskets in gas tanks mounted under the rear seats that release gas vapor into the cabin.

The plaintiffs do not argue that they did not purchase the vehicles from Mercedes-Benz USA, but rather that the lack of a recall meant that neither they nor the previous owners would have been able to make a reasonable effort to uncover the gas tank defect on their own. On the other hand, they point to several pieces of evidence indicating that the company may have possibly concealed the defect to any buyers and future owners.

The first is that the company changed the gasket design several times beginning soon after the W211 E-Class was launched in 2003. According to the class action lawsuit depositions, the company had been changing the composition several times, increasing the amount of fluorine to improve the resistance to corrosion. Plaintiffs allege that the company neither notified car owners nor did they inform the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Moreover, the plaintiffs note that replacement gaskets reached such a high rate by 2012 that “in a population of 281,727 cars, that is a replacement rate of nearly one in every four cars,” and more importantly that gasket sales are four times higher than any other item for the W211 model. Further, the plaintiffs allege that at least one service technician was told to mask the odor of gasoline with coffee grounds when an E-Class was brought in for service, allegedly to prolong service until the warranty period expired.

With this consistent activity alleged, the plaintiffs in the Mercedes gas tank defect class action lawsuit argue that while there may not be a duty to disclose any issue to later buyers, the fact that Mercedes-Benz USA never did so in the first place made it impossible for people to find out about it. Therefore, secondhand buyers were unable to find out about the problem.

The plaintiffs are represented by Cale Conley, Ranse Partin and Matthew Q. Wetherington of Conley Griggs Partin LLP, and Neil A. Goro and Joseph M. Dunn of Wigington Rumley Dunn & Ritch LLP.

The Mercedes-Benz Gas Tank Defect Class Action Lawsuit is McCabe, et al. v. Daimler AG, et al., Case No. 1:12-cv-2494, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.

UPDATE: The Mercedes-Benz Gas Tank Defect Class Action Lawsuit ended in a summary judgement in favor of the defendant on August 20, 2015.