Submitted by Aiken Jacobsen on
The last several years have been filled with major auto recalls and vehicle safety issues. We have posted many updates about the ongoing Toyota recalls as well as news about personal injury litigation against the company.
While recalls are meant to protect car owners from safety defects, these protections don't always extend to those who rent cars. Many car rental companies continue to rent or sell cars that have been subject to a federal safety recall. In some cases, this negligence has resulted in fatal car accidents.
A new law could end this practice in the state of California. Lawmakers are considering a bill which would prohibit rental car companies in the state from renting or selling cars subject to federal safety recall.
While the measure is statewide, efforts to promote the bill have roots in Sacramento. The proposed legislation has major public support from the Sacramento-based consumer advocacy group Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety (CARS), as well as a mother who lost her two daughters because of a faulty rental car.
The woman's two adult daughters were killed in a 2004 car accident on Highway 101. At the time of the accident, they were driving a rented PT Cruiser subject to a safety recall. Last June, the girl's parents were awarded $15 million in a wrongful death lawsuit against the car rental company.
The grieving mother and the advocacy group CARS would like to prevent a tragedy like this from happening to anyone else. This measure is part of a larger effort to get legal protections for rental car users. If the bill passes, it would be the first law of its kind in the United States.
Californians have witnessed the devastation that can result when a car's safety defects are not fixed. If car owners are protected by safety recalls, car renters should be afforded similar protections.
Source: The Sacramento Bee online, "California bill targets rental car defects," Mark Glover, 22 April 2011
