$14.4 million? Hah! Nissan spends that much on toilet paper every week. It's a drop in the pan and whatever won't get writen off will never translate to higher costs on cars or service.

man am i glad i got a '96.

 

As long as this country tolerates people who refuse to be RESPONSIBLE for their actions, then we will see more and more bogus/lack of commonsense/idiot/..... lawsuits. Why not sue the owner of the other car(not enough $$$$)? Why not sue the maker of the other car for making a tank that destroyed the Max? And, was he wearing a seatbelt? How fast was he going? Yeah, we all drive the speed limit!

You have the right(free country) to research your car prior to purchase. If you purchase it, then you get what you pay for. Nissan didn't hide the crash test results. It is free info from the gov't and cost a couple of bucks for ConsumerReports buyers guide. You also have the right to pick your own insurance limits and coverage. Were both drivers underinsured?

Vehicle automakers make changes yearly to just about every vehicle they make. Some are for safety and some aren't. Should I sue an automaker for a rearend collision because my '1985 whatever' didn't have a 3rd brake light and they put them on in 1986 and it would have prevented the accident. Should we sue because in the late '80's early '90's some cars had airbags in place of motorized seatbelts(for all you who unhooked/avoided the seatbelt and kissed the airbag) or vice versa. Nissan has no choice but to appeal. If they don't, that means every car on the road is a liability if it is improved over time(every year/every update/every newer generation). This is one dangerous precedent for all automakers.

Geez, I just spilled my hot coffee on me. Gotta sue the coffee shop. And, because of the spill, I tripped on something and fell through the bug screen in the window. Gotta sue the window maker for not labelling it a bug screen only and not a people screen. And I gotta sue my employer for letting me drink coffee and the building owner/builder(whoever has more money) for allowing something under the rug to trip me. And before falling through the window, my hand brushed up against the window fan and the fan screen didn't prevent all my fingers from being cut off. Plus, I will sue the landscaper. I ended up cutting myself on all those thorns in the shrubs. Then, I rolled over and banged my head on the concrete. I am gonna sue the concrete makers because the concrete is hard as a rock and gave me a headache. While I am at it. I am going to sue the ambulance for a bumpy ride. And then sue the ER/doctor for incompetence(no reason--rumour is they settle quickly outside of court). Did I miss anyone


http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index....6101960672.xml

 

It's true though, people need to take responsibility for their own actions, accidents happen and by blaming others it just makes the situation worse.

 

i had a 95 maxima as well...........it flipped over.........5 people in the car - no one was hurt(not a scratch)..........but the roof of the car was pounded in all the way

 

so how much would the family gotten if he didn't survive

 

Good point. Probably nothing. The lawsuit wouldn't even have happened.

 

Not true.
Anyway, a normal society would say this fella died, somebody is liable for his lost wages which should go to his dependents. As far as all the kids who are grown getting a piece of the action, if they're not dependents, they get nada.

 

I am probably wrong here, but this is my theory.

Back around that time Nissan was having big time money issues. Since Nissan is located in Japan shipping a car to Europe probably isn't as expensive as shipping a car to the US. So to save some money they decided to take some of the safety stuff out of the car.

I am probably way off, but I think Nissan probably did that to save money, since they were going in the hole, until Renault bought them. And now Nissan is back on the ball.

Just my $.02

Didn't that happen to some old lady? She was at a McDonald's going through the drive-thru and she put the coffee between her legs and it spilled on her. And she sued Mickey-Ds for millions of dollars, because the COFFEE WAS HOT! Now that's the most retarted law-suit I've ever heard.

 

Im not sure if this is relevant or if it the answer to the question, but quite often when researching parts of a 96, you will see a reference to build dates before and after 02/96. Could be that this is the date indicating the production changes...

Any thoughts????

 

if you say that you are obviously an overpriveleged stuck up moron who has never seen outside of your own state, much less the country. as one who has been to many, many countries in the 2nd/3rd world (Russia, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria, Mexico, Honduras) I can tell you that we in the United States are the most priveleged people in the entire world. in Nigeria, in africa, since they earned independence in 1960 not ONE SINGLE PRESIDENT has sucessfully served a full term because of a militray coup de tas. when was the last time that happened in the United States? when was teh last time any blood was shed because of a power change? indeed, Thomas Jefferson was right when he called it a bloodless revolution. sure, some people do stupid stuff here. but if you wanna bash the United States of America take it somewhere else you stupid stuckup b@st@rd. have a nice day.

wow...now im scared to ride in my 95

 

i cant believe anyone can say that nissan is at fault here. all cars made by manufacturerers need to pass crash tests or they are not on the road. regardless of the rating, nissan still passed or it would not be on the road. if you honestly believe nissan is at fault, take a minute to think of this same incident but in different terms:

say a man is in a hot tub relaxing and listening to a radio which is placed on a bbq which happens to be next to the hot tub. then another man walks by, grazing the bbq and knocking the radio into the hot tub and electricuting the man and causing damages to this man's brain, etc. now does this man have the right to go after sony because in europe, the same radio can be bought waterproof? no.

the suit is rediculous and I dont think the man deserves a dime from nissan. he and is lawyers should persue the other man who caused the accident.

 

Possibly.

This is similar to how some of the 99's have a different ECU than the other 4th gens. A couple of 99 owners have noticed that they can't do an ECU check like most 4th gens because their ECU doesn't look like what is described in the instructions.

Same thing with the strut bolts, they're a different size on some of the 99's I believe.

 

eh, what are you gonna do? im over it

 

Like you 97+ owners are gonna walk away from a head on crash
You will be hurt just as much, but at least us 96's will get 14 mil to soothe our pain
I do think this lawsuit is BS, but if it causes Nissan to start bringing their latest and greatest to the states, that would be good.

 

Yeah, and it couldnt hurt for nissan to do a little better in crash testing... the altima is a start

 

I thought that was a stupid lawsuit until I found out in a law class what was really going on. The reason the law suit worked was because there were over 300 documented complaints of McDonalds coffee being to hot. McDonalds didn't do anything about it. McDonalds figured out that they could get more coffee out of the coffee beans if they brewed it at a hotter temperature so thats what they did. Thier coffee was too hot,gave the lady 3rd degree burns so she sued. She wouldn't had a case if there hadn't been so many complaints of the coffee being so hot.

 

If it is too hot, don't drink it and don't buy it. If you drink and drive, you're the jackazz that deserves to have hot coffee spilled on your a$$. Resposibility. Plus I like my coffee hot, dark and ripe.

My fake story was just a gathering of lawsuits that hit the newpapers in the last 5 years or so:
Hot coffee and sue.
Stick fingers into fan blades and sue.
Trip, fall, and sue.
Lean out of window, fall through screen and sue.
Unknown if driving fast(yeah like you drive the limit), not defensively, unknown if wearing seatbelt, unknown if crashed with dump truck or yugo, crashed anyway and then sue.
Underinflated tires, non-speed rating allterrain tires on SUV, driving fast in hot weather, blowouts, rollovers and sue.

The '95 Max was not an inferior product. It was sold here legally. Its crash tests were public. You are a consumer with rights to buy whatever you want. If the idiot doesn't research his purchase, then he gets what he deserves. OJ is free doesn't mean he's innocent. Nissan loses $14.4 million doesn't mean it is a faulty Max in '95. This guy was a successful business man..... like he isn't known by the jury, lawyers, judge.......if he was so successful.

What really ****es me off is that my tax dollars will support him even though he is now a millionaire. Don't forget all those state/federal funds for disabled/invalid/unfortunate.....people. Like his family cares. They are rich and he will be stuck in a nursing/rehab center rotting away. Because he is incompetent, the money will go to the family. So, after they recieve the $14 million, he will still be broke and on ssi, tdi, ssdi, welfare, stamps, sect8, medcare/caid, hca........ and everything else.

Just because you read the lawsuit in class doesn't mean it was stupid. If you are studying law, then you want to make money like all the other ambulance chasers.

 

the sad part is if she had made the coffee at home she wouldnt have a leg to stand on. since there was 2nd party it's obviously all their fault. what happened to common sense? we all know/expect coffe to be hot when we buy it. you can feel the heat through the cup. isnt that warnig enough. didnt she have the sense to put the cup in a cupholder? since then anytime you buy coffee/hot chocolate the cup has a warning "contents are hot" NO $HIT!!!!!!!

 

maximas to mcdonalds coffee. wow.

 

you forgot the one about the dude that is sueing McDonalds, Burger King and some other chains for makin him fat. Currently they're looking for other people to join in the lawsuit so if you've been eating at these chains five days a week or more and you're obese, then you should look into this.

And to answer your question Lime, to sue the owner of the car that crossed the median would be foolish. Lawyers usually go for the big money in which case would be his insurance company. However this goes way beyond that cause the car had safety issues to begin with, so now its time to go after the car manufacturer.

 

If Nissan hadn't sold cars outside of America with additional reinforcements, would there have been a lawsuit?
What if he had died? Would there even be a lawsuit? A jury couldn't have been swayed by a victim who suffers a lower quality of life.

AFAIK, Nissan met the required safety standards in American in 1995. It's up to us to demand stricter safety requirements. Driving is not a right or freedom, it's a privilege that you should undertake knowing the risks that are involved. You determine what car to drive, so it's your fault if you choose a car that does worse in crash tests than another.

I don't blame Nissan for the poor crash test results, or that they knowingly made the car better for Europe. They weren't required to make the car as safe for America, so why spend the money? It was a business decision. They weren't out to hurt people. Safety costs money to do R&D, testing, and manufacturing. In the automotive world, the usual governing rule is that you make the car "just safe enough" for the least amount of money as possible. Cost reduction rules all and every penny is counted. If automakers decided to make the cars safer "just because they want to," then their prices could go up and a competitor steals their sales.

 

Blame the gov't. There the ones that make the rules. Why is Nissan at fault for building a car to the US specs? There is no law that says it has to be better. It the euro specs are stricter, then of course those cars will crash better(if crashing could be called better). You decide, would you rather be in a Yugo/Metro/Justy...or a Maxima? Is the Maxima called Maxima overseas?

It took me all of 5 minutes to find the test results for every car out there. Too bad that US standards suck.
http://www.nhtsa.gov/cars/testing/ncap/cars/555.html
http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/testing/
http://www1.tpgi.com.au/users/mpaine/ncaplist.html
http://www.hwysafety.org/
http://www.crashtest.com/nissan/ie.htm
http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/NCAP/Cars.cfm
http://www.fia.com/tourisme/safety/safint.htm
http://www.euroncap.com/index.htm

I gotta get in on that class action fast foods lawsuit