Three events in 2014 have increased awareness of how consumers could fall prey to corporate cover-ups and negligence.

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Increased Vulnerability of Consumers to
Corporate Incompetence
Corporate negligence can lead to expensive lawsuits and
cost a business dearly. Big
companies aim for big
profits, and sometimes
make wrong decisions --
inadvertently or deliberately
-- in the process. It’s no surprise that corporate negligence
lawyers have their hands full these days
General Motors under Fire
One of the sectors where corporate negligence is becoming
more and more evident is in the automobile industry.
Automobile companies claim that their cars go through the
most rigorous quality control processes before they are put
up for sale, so why do we see so many recalls?
2014 has attracted much negative attention for General
Motors (GM) due to lives lost by accidents caused by a
troublesome component. But GM seems to have known
about its faulty ignition switch even before the initial stages
of reported deaths from related accidents.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
investigated a 2007 accident in Wisconsin in which it was
identified that the 2005 Chevrolet Cobalt’s ignition switch
would have caused the airbags to get disabled. This
investigation was dug up in 2012 by Erin Shipp, a forensics
expert, who visited the website of the Highway Traffic
Safety Administration for help in investigating another

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similar accident in West Virginia in which a 2005
Chevrolet Cobalt was involved. Shipp was hired for the
lawsuit by the plaintiff’s attorney.
When attorneys of General Motors were informed of this
finding, they seemed to have no answer and promptly
moved to settle the lawsuit, preventing it from going
public. In spite of the company’s attorneys being aware of
the faulty ignition switch through these or perhaps more
incidents, and the inclusion of Shipp’s findings in the
company’s internal report, GM only began recalling its cars
featuring the problematic and dangerous ignition switch
nearly two years later after multiple accidents across the
country in which 13 people lost their lives for the same
reason.
Delayed Recall Cost 13 Lives
The recall, which totaled 2.6 million cars in 2014, was too
late and should have been effected earlier which would
have helped save many lives. The recall, and GM’s
explanation for its delay in recalling, are mentioned in the
company’s internal report that was circulated on June 5,
2014 though lawyers of plaintiffs and relatives of victims
are highly skeptical of the company’s seeming innocence
and its explanation that the top management was unaware
of this issue due to the incompetent functioning of its legal
department and other employees. The company has denied
conspiracy and has announced the axing of 15 top level
staff.

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The Problematic and Dangerous Ignition Switch
The problem with the ignition switch on the Chevrolet
Cobalt, Saturn Ion and other GM cars that featured the
problematic component was that it switched or rotated from
the “ignition” to the “accessory” position with the slightest
touch and stalled the engine while the individual was
driving the car – this stalling also deactivated the power
steering and airbags meaning the driver had to suddenly
negotiate the car out of the moving traffic to the side of the
road. If he or she hit something major or was hit heavily by
something as the engine stalled and the car suddenly
slowed, the airbags wouldn’t work as well since the engine
had turned off. This nerve-wracking circumstance was the
cause of more than 50 crashes and around a dozen deaths.
But strangely, the incompetence of this ignition switch
design was detected by GM’s engineers on the test bed way
back in 2004, long before stray incidents were beginning to
be reported.
While GM seems to have understood the damage caused
and apologized for the lives lost, it only shifts the blame to
some careless or irresponsible employees rather than
accepting the fact that top management being unaware of a
major safety issue for nearly ten years is plain negligence
and incompetence. As one of the attorneys for the victims
thinks, it remains to be seen what other safety issues are
lurking in GM cars that the top management is not “aware”
of.

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Quack Advice Accusations against “The Dr. Oz Show”
The conflict between Senators and Mehmet Oz who
recommends alternative and natural weight loss dietary
supplements through his “The Dr. Oz Show” has been
reasonably well documented. The public has continually
been discouraged from following Oz’s “quack” advice,
prompting suggestions that Oz is either not expert enough
to prescribe products that would not work, or that he has
ulterior motives. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and
the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation,
a subcommittee of the US Senate, have been against
Mehmet Oz and have set about questioning his claims, even
interrogating him on Capitol Hill.
Senator Claire McCaskill was one of the more vehement
opponents of Dr. Oz. It seems we’ll never know who the
well-intentioned individual is – Mehmet Oz or McCaskill,
since a website reported the latter’s connections with some
major pharmaceutical companies. According to the website,
McCaskill was the recipient of campaign contributions
exceeding $146,000 from a major pharmaceutical retailer in
North America and other funds from other corporate
majors. Has this influenced her attack on Dr. Oz, or is
Mehmet Oz not innocent of accusations of receiving money
from the dietary supplement manufacturers? Or are things
amiss with The Dr. Oz Show itself?
Are consumers being taken for a ride here, or are TV shows
or companies being innocently targeted in some cases?
Whatever be the situation, the services of expert law firms
can prove very valuable to businesses as well as consumers.

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Unsafe Antivirus Product from Norton
In another case of unclear corporate intentions, Symantec
Corp, manufacturer of Norton Antivirus, has escaped
punishment in a lawsuit which alleged that security
breaches by hackers into its antivirus product’s software
code was not reported to potential consumers. The products
were continued to be sold as among the safest and most
effective products out there, indulging in what the
plaintiffs’ attorney considered deceptive advertising.
However a federal judge moved to dismiss the putative
class action against Symantec that accused it of conscious
selling of unreliable antivirus software. According to the
judge, there was not much specific or critical information to
substantiate the plaintiffs’ claims about the company’s
alleged fraudulent and deceptive practices.
Each of these three cases reveals the incongruity over the
actions of companies. It is hard for consumers to get to
know what the truth is.