Toyota Pulls Strings Within NHTSA To Kill Probes
An investigation is uncovering the amount of influence former NHTSA employees may have had over the current Toyota probe. Critics in Congress say that Toyota had help from two former NHTSA employees. Christopher Santucci worked as a defect investigator for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administrator. He then got a job at Toyota, the very company he had been in charge of investigating. He worked for Christopher Tinto, who also used to work for NHTSA. Now with these two together at Toyota they helped to limit probes into Toyota records show. Together, they pointed the NHTSA probe to focus on the brief burst acceleration instead of the runaway vehicles that have led to so many accidents and deaths.
Toyota documents that CBS News obtained from 2006 show that while NHTSA wanted company documents on “a broad testing and analysis question” concerning the Camry and Solara vehicle engine surge, Toyota in negotiations with NHTSA, got the agency to “reduce the response” and essentially provide much less data. A third ex-NHTSA employee also helped Toyota, former NHTSA attorney Kenneth Weinstein. Joan Claybrook, who used to head NHTSA, characterizes it like this. “They maneuvered and manipulated and I think Bamboozled the agency.” Congress is taking the apparent conflict-of-interest question before Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “Absolutely not” he said.
While other automakers reportedly do not use former-NHTSA employees like Toyota does, Santucci says it works out well for both the agency and Toyota. NHTSA is now investigating its own past behavior examining whether Toyota was forthcoming in providing all of the materials it should have over the years. The inspector general is investigating whether NHTSA acted as a watchdog agency or a lapdog to industry.
Toyota problems with unintended acceleration have been reported for years and NHTSA has taken in tens of thousands of complaints. 34 wrongful deaths, at least, are blamed on the out-of-control vehicles. The problems were apparently brewing for years while Toyota ignored the problem and played the “blame-the-victim” card, at a risk to the public as we now see.
Source report: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/25/cbsnews_investigates/main6243927.shtml?tag=cbsnewsTwoColUpperPromoArea\
