Put yourself in the driver’s seat of Ford Motor Co.’s legal department. There’s a problem with one of the automaker’s most important products: the Crown Victoria. Annual sales exceed $1 billion. Cops, especially, love the big sedans; Ford has 85 percent of the police cruiser market. But highway patrol officers are dying. They pull over drivers, and while they write them up, their own cars are rear-ended — often by speeding drunk drivers. And then those Crown Vics burst into flames.
From 1993 to 2003, 10 officers died this way. Ford was hit with personal injury suits and class actions filed around the country. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) opened an investigation; two state legislatures scheduled hearings; and the attorney general of Arizona — where three officers died — told anyone willing to listen that she was up in arms. If this wasn’t enough, CNN aired an hour-long special on the Crown Vic problem. It included dramatic aerial footage of one of the burning cars that looked like it was straight from an action thriller.
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