NHTSA, Toyota Question Runaway Prius

The well-publicized runaway 2008 Toyota Prius and its driver that hit the news last week have come under intense scrutiny. Later today, both the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Toyota will announce they could not re-create the incident.

To many, that might not prove anything, since past incidents have also been hard or impossible to re-create. However, a Toyota representative who was at the California dealership where the car was tested by the government and the company says there is little possibility the driver’s story is accurate.

The congressional observer who was there concurred. "In this case, knowing that we are able to push the car around the shop, it does not appear to be feasibly possible, both electronically and mechanically, that his gas pedal was stuck to the floor and he was slamming on the brake at the same time.”
 
However, the spokesman also said he was not accusing the driver of lying.

Automotive blog Jalopnik has been digging into the past of the driver, Jim Sikes, and uncovered a past of financial problems and accusations of fraud from a former business partner.

The California Highway Patrol says there is no evidence of a hoax and would not pursue an investigation unless “they can completely disprove Mr. Sikes.”  The CHP says that because there were no injuries or property damage, it does not need to keep the investigation open. 

Prius report questioned, defended (Detroit Free Press)

Comments

I think the two things to take away from this are that this doesn't prove this couldn't ever happen in any Toyota vehicle and that there are so many holes and odd things in Mr. Sikes's story that we can't legitimately classify this as a true unintended acceleration incident.

If this guy did lie then he should be fined or receive some sort of punishment. I see this as similar to someone yelling "fire" in a public place.

i remember the police officer said that he smelled the brake burning and saw the break light on, are those two both lied?

I guess it's possible he'd made several hard stops and then was gently riding them, which might not activate the override. I think they need to see if any witnesses will come forward and say what they saw.

It seems like only old Americans are the ones suffering from the "stuck accelerator". Does this happen in other countries?

@Hmm
Europe and Japan have been exposed to these recalls also. There was even a story about a Prius that went through a retainer wall somewhere in Europe I believe.

SG, it was a retainer wall somewhere in the US, not Europe.

Yan, think how easy it would be to ride the brake hard enough to make it smell or smoke. If one wanted their 15 minutes of fame what better way than to own a Toyota and claim it to be faulty. This Prius needs to be evaluated more to determine if the car was the problem or the car owner.

Toyota and others knew they were having issues and attempted to hide it. All Car Companies should have came forward with a full disclosures of what car were dangerous. Instead of waiting for a huge media blitz and tons of public pressure. I never seen so many car companies GM - NISSAN - TOYOTA - HYUNDAI having recalls all at the same time. I had no idea my car was affected until I looked on http://www.carpedalrecall.com and found I had a bad Anti Lock control unit on my 2008 Pontiac G8 , my co workers Ford Truck had a recall also. So be careful

Like I said when this first happened...he probably owes more than it's worth and wanted out of that loan. Well he did it!!

Thanks for sharing this valuable information;
But still I strongly believe in quality given by Nissan, and always preferred to buy it only.