Appeals court upholds $11 million jury award in Toyota crash
Associated Press ·
Koua Fong Lee outside of the federal courthouse in Minneapolis
in 2015. Brandt Williams | MPR News file
An appeals court has affirmed an $11 million jury award related to a Minnesota crash that killed three people and resulted in the wrongful imprisonment of a driver.
A jury in 2015 determined that Toyota was 60 percent to blame for the 2006 crash in St. Paul. A lawsuit alleged the crash was caused by a throttle design defect in a 1996 Camry that caused it to suddenly accelerate.
Toyota argued there was no defect. The company said driver Koua Fong Lee accidentally hit the gas instead of the brake.
• In 2014: As feds slam Toyota over hiding sticky pedal, let's remember Koua Fong Lee
Lee was incarcerated until 2010 after he won a new trial which showed he was wrongfully convicted. A subsequent civil trial in 2015 found Toyota liable. The 8th U.S. District Court of Appeals Friday affirmed the jury award.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2017/06/09/appeals-court-upholds-11-million-jury-award-in-toyota-crash
