Subrogation Issues
Our firm has been involved in several subrogation issues involving vehicles and people. We take all facts into consideration before offering a conclusion. There is no rush to judgment and our principals are sound. Our testing can be replicated when involving such claims.
Included are a few examples as to what our firm has been involved in:
Camper manufacturer blamed for fire to camper and vehicle.
We represented the insurance company for the camper manufacturer. The company that insured the vehicle subrogated against the camper company and those that made components for the camper. Interestingly enough, the insurance company's fire expert stated the cause of the fire was from the camper propane bottles serving as blowtorches igniting the rear of the vehicle. He was wrong and it was our job to show that he could not in any way shape or form support such a conclusion based on any type of scientific certainty.
First, the propane bottles were mounted the wrong way for this to ever happen. They were pointed with the valves facing the camper, not the rear of the truck. He had never examined the pictures take from the fire department at the scene which revealed the tanks were not present and were placed across they road by the fire department. He apparently did not check the recall for cracked transmission cases which would spray transmission fluid on the hot exhaust. He also did not consider that the vehicle when it pulled over after emitting white smoke (burning transmission fluid) was parked in very tall dry grass during a drought!
With the vehicle parked, we proved that the catalytic converter had started the fire in the grass. The grass fire melted the plastic fuel tank there by letting burning gasoline leak out and follow a path melting the right rear alloy wheel. These theories could all be replicated. The vehicle was a total burn from the bottom up, while only 20% of the frontal portion of the camper was fire damaged.
During destructive testing of all recovered components from the camper, the expert's engineer stated there was a problem. The problem being no ignition source for the propane tanks. At this point, the expert stated that the insured must have thrown a cigarette out the window. Bottom line--we could prove our conclusions and the insurance fire expert could not. Another very chilling problem was that the vehicle towing the camper was never considered in the investigation and all that was considered was the camper. This in itself is a problem because they were both coupled together at the time of the fire!
Our client was exonerated of any wrong doing or defect and this just went back to an inexperienced vehicle fire investigator that wanted to blame something else other than the client he did lots of work for.
Claim Against Ford
When there is an accident and a recall, the insurance company may decide to subrogate against the manufacturer. We were asked to look into this claim for the client insurance company. The recall was for the cruise control to stick and continue accelerating the vehicle. The insured was found deceased after the crash. I asked what type of blood splatter there was in the vehicle or for photos depicting this. The purpose was to determine if the insured was dead before the crash or after the crash. I asked for an autopsy and was told there was none available. In Wisconsin, if under 55 there is commonly and autopsy. The insurance company found the autopsy and found something very exculpatory to the case. Blood alcohol was .333 which was 4 x the legal limited.
I explained to the insurance company as to how Ford would defend this case. They would line up 10 shot glasses on the jury rail and say "This is what the driver was fueled by before driving our vehicle." This ultimately could have gone backwards on my client and we prevented it. Since we work for anyone searching for the truth, we have the ability to look at these cases as to how the future opposition would as well.
Our firm does a complete work up on subrogation cases because if the wrong manufacturer or product is blamed, it can be very costly.