Feds face tough laws requiring specific intent in possible criminal case over GM ignition issues
After the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, prosecutors charged a BP unit with violating the federal Clean Water Act over the deaths of brown pelicans.
Like similar consumer-safety laws involving pharmaceuticals and food, no specific intent is required to prove a violation, the New York Times (reg. req.) reports.
But prosecutors are required to show specific intent in criminal cases against automakers who sell defective and potentially deadly products. That could make it very difficult to pursue criminal charges over General Motors’ ignition-switch issues if investigators determine the company or employees were aware of the defect and failed to disclose it to regulators.
“When you don’t have the legal tools to prosecute someone who acted badly and hurt someone else, it is incredibly frustrating,” Matthew Schwartz told the newspaper. Currently a Boies, Schiller & Flexner partner, he formerly worked at the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan. The office is in charge of the GM probe, but Schwartz was not himself involved in the investigation.
A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment, and a spokesman for GM said the company is cooperating fully with federal investigators.
Several efforts to strengthen federal laws to make it easier to prosecute over deadly auto defects went nowhere during recent decades, the Times reports. But a representative of an auto industry trade group says such laws would do nothing to speed up regulatory response to safety concerns, once raised.
A GM ignition compensation fund administered by well-known attorney Kenneth Feinberg has so far approved 393 claims. Of that number, 269 were injury claims and 124 were death claims, the Detroit News reports.
Related coverage:
ABAJournal.com: “GM legal department is reportedly under scrutiny by prosecutors”
ABAJournal.com: “10 years after fatal accident, conviction is reversed; GM knew its car was to blame but kept quiet”
ABAJournal.com: “GM bankruptcy filing in 2009 blocks economic loss claims in ignition-switch cases, judge rules”
ABAJournal.com: “Cover-up claim about GM ignition-switch issues is ‘reckless and outrageous,’ law firm says”
