 
Plaintiffs in Honda Window Regulator Case
File Opposition to Defendant's Motion to Dismiss
August 15, 2012
by Casey Neeley, cneeley@glass.com
Yesterday, plaintiffs in Grodzitsky v. American Honda filed an opposition
in response to Honda's motion to dismiss plaintiff's master class
action complaint. The original complaint, filed on July 24, claims
that the window regulator in certain Honda vehicles is defective
and results in the sidelite falling into the door frame or becoming
stuck in the fully-open position.
Honda claims in its motion
to dismiss that "all named Plaintiffs alleged window regulator
failures occurred after-and in most cases, well after-their limited
warranties expired."
"Plaintiffs assert that Honda made certain representations,
wholly unrelated to window regulators
which [they] claim were
false. However, none of them recall or identify any specific advertisements
they allegedly read, saw, or heard," read Honda's court documents.
The plaintiffs reply to this argument in their opposition
by saying that, "Honda devotes the bulk of its motion to arguing
that the window regulator defect, which causes the side windows
in class vehicles to unexpectedly fail and become inoperable-sometimes
shattering along the way-is not a safety hazard and is indistinguishable
from a fully operational window a driver or occupant voluntarily
rolls down. Honda's argument is illogical: a sudden and unexpected
falling (and shattering) of a window while driving plainly implicates
safety, as does the driver's inability to open or close that window
if and as needed."
In the motion to dismiss, Honda alleges that plaintiffs do not have
the legal ability to make a claim on an expired warranty without
"trying to extend the terms of their express written warranties
indefinitely." Honda also cites plaintiffs' inability to "show
a legitimate, plausible safety issue."
In response, the plaintiffs allege Honda acknowledged the safety
concern by issuing a recall on additional vehicles.
"Honda's position conflicts with testimony its own employees
gave in other cases and contradicts Honda's own acknowledgement
of the safety hazard the window regulator defect poses: just last
year, Honda issued a partial recall of other vehicles based upon
the very same defect, warning vehicle owners that windows affected
by the defect 'may bind and shatter onto the occupants,'" reads
the opposition.
Judge Stephen V. Wilson granted a hearing on the motions Tuesday,
which will take place on September 17.
In the complaint
filed February 9, Phyllis Grodzitsky, owner of a Honda Odyssey,
and Jeremy Bordelon, owner of a Honda Element, alleged that they
reported repeated failures of window regulators in their vehicles.
Grodzitsky further claims that she contacted her local Honda service
manager and was told, "all [Honda Odysseys] have that problem."
The vehicle models in question include the Honda Odyssey, Pilot,
Element, Accord, CR-V, Civic and Acura MDX between the years of
1994-2007.
"Honda knew of the window regulator defect, yet failed to disclose
and concealed the defect from class members and the public and Honda
continued to market and misrepresent the class vehicles as 'reliable'
and 'durable' vehicles, which they are not," read the original
complaint.
Plaintiffs have since successfully turned the original complaint
into a class
action suit which now includes two other named plaintiffs, Mark
David Olson and Sohal Shah.
This story is an original story by AGRR™ magazine/glassBYTEs.com™. Subscribe to AGRR™ Magazine.
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