One-fifth the moving parts of a conventional piston motor, smoother running, less maintenance, and for fuel? Any liquid that burned.

The car was a real hit, author Steve Lehto told an audience last week at Stair Public Library, and then it disappeared.

Lehto’s visit was part of an author tour through the Michigan Notable Book program. His book, “Chrysler’s Turbine Car: the rise and fall of Detroit’s coolest creation,” is one of 20 books chosen for 2011 by the Library of Michigan.

To Read More of this Article Posted by the State Line Observer Click Here!

Recently, we have been receiving a lot of calls from people who own Ford Escapes with defective transmissions. While we encounter car owners from across the spectrum of car ownership, the number of Ford Escape complaints we have seen is remarkable. The consumers who have contacted us have similar complaints: the automatic transmissions in their Escapes “slip” – a condition that results in harsh shifting. The vehicles will bang into gear. Sometimes the car will stay in gear too long, and then slam into the next gear. The engine RPMs will swing wildly up and down.

Ford is aware of the problem. They have issued at least one recall (#10B15) on this problem, but customers report to us that the recall does not solve the problem. Some customers are told that they are the only ones who are reporting this condition. Other customers are told that there is a problem with their car but that the dealer cannot fix it. Some have been told that Ford is “working” on the problem, and that they should wait a little longer.

If you own a 2010 Ford Escape, here is what you need to do.

1. Pay close attention to how your vehicle shifts. If it acts up, take it in immediately for repair to your Ford Dealer.

2. Make sure they document the problem with the transmission on your repair order and get a copy of the repair order for yourself.

3. When you get the car back, watch the transmission closely. Some clients have told us that their vehicles were returned to them in exactly the same defective condition as when they dropped it off.

4. Keep brining your vehicle back for repair until it has been repaired three (3) times. At that point, call us and we can discuss the next step.

The Ford Escape is an expensive vehicle. There is no reason you should be required to put up with repeated repairs to it – especially if those repairs don’t work.

For more information call Steve at the Dailey Law Firm at 866-66-Lawyer

Free Press Staff Writer

Longtime Chrysler employee Bill Stidham thought he was getting a good deal when he bought his new Dodge Ram pickup.

Like thousands of auto company workers and retirees, Stidham was entitled to a big employee discount on his truck. So, as a 32-year Chrysler employee, he believed buying the truck should have been a simple transaction: Go to a Chrysler or Dodge dealer and pay a set price- no haggling, no numbers games, no reason to fear getting a bad deal.

“It all seemed pretty straightforward,” said Stidham, 55, of Troy.

But a few months ago-about a year after taking his truck home- Stidham got a call from the salesman who cut the deal.

“I told him, ‘You were done wrong,’” said Tom Hayes, the 31 year-old salesman who had been fired by Sterling Heights Dodge in January after working at the dealership for about eight months.

Hayes later showed Stidham using paperwork from the deal, that he had gotten his employee discount but had paid about $1,700 more than he thought he was paying for dealer installed options.

“I got cheated and I want to get it straightened out,” said Stidharm, the lead plaintiff in a class action lawsuit filed this month on behalf of Chrysler employees against Sterling Heights Dodge and another dealership.

Stidham drives a Chrysler parts truck every day from Detroit to Dayton, Ohio. “I’ll never cross the door of that place again.”

In a lawsuit filed in April against Sterling Heights Dodge in Macomb County Circuit Court and in interviews, Hayes alleges that the dealership regularly misled Chrysler employees into paying inflated prices, forging customer signatures and charging customers for warranties they hadn’t agreed to.

Hayes said he was fired because he threatened to alert regulators to what he said was the dealer’s deceptive practices. His bosses told him he was dismissed for losing his auto insurance, he said.

Hayes’ allegations echo those made in another wrongful discharge lawsuit that Anthony Camarda, a former salesman at Meadowbrook Dodge in Rochester Hills, filed in February in Oakland County Circuit Court. He also claims he was fired after threatening to reveal deceptive practices to regulators.

The Michigan Secretary of State’s Bureau of Automotive Regulation is investigating both dealerships, Jim Hunsucker, director of the agency’s dealer division, said Thursday.

In court papers, Sterling Heights Dodge and Meadowbrook Dodge deny the salesmen’s claims. Meadowbrook Dodge has files a counterclaim against Camarda, accusing him of slandering the dealership.

Both dealerships are run by members of the same family. Anthony Viviano, general manager of Sterling Heights Dodge, did not respond to requests for an interview. Nor did Salvadore Viviano, general manager of Meadowbrook Dodge, and Mary Viviano, the dealership’s office manager.

This month, both dealerships became targets of a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of Stidham and what’ his lawyer says are potentially hundreds of other Chrysler employees who may have been overcharged thousands of dollars on dealer -installed options and misled into believing they received their employee discount-when they didn’t.

“Does Chrysler really have to come out and say don’t steal from our employees?” asked Steve Lehto, the Farmington Hills attorney, who filed the class action lawsuit on Dec. 13 in Oakland County Circuit Court.

Lehto said he is urging all Chrysler employees who bought vehicles at the two dealerships in the past six years to take a second look at their deals.

Chrysler ,spokesman Mike McKesson said the company is aware of the lawsuits but had no comment because the corporation is not a defendant. Dealerships are paid a fee by Chrysler Corp. for processing employee vehicle purchases but generally don’t make as much money on the deals as they do by selling to the public.

Dealers are not required to participate in the employee purchase program. Chrysler has not had complaints from employees about the employee purchase program at any dealerships, McKesson said.

That’s because employees don’t know when they are being overcharged, said Stidham, both sales men and their attorneys. In many cases, Chrysler employees were never given key documents that would alert them they were paying more than they should with their discount, they said.

“Many times employees and retirees are paying more than you or I do walking in off the street,” said Elmer Roller, the Detroit attorney representing Hayes and Camarda. “They get blindsided. They are trusting and they have an expectation that they don’t have to do the math.”

The most important document is what Chrysler workers commonly call “the green sheet”-the company-issued “Employee/Retiree New Vehicle Purchase/Lease Agreement.” On the front page of the form is a worksheet that shows how the employee price was calculated- and discloses what the employee is being charged for dealer-installed options. Dealerships are required to give employees a copy of this form, but Hayes said his clients seldom got a copy.

Because Chrysler employees trust the dealership, Hayes said, they regularly signed blank documents and rarely read others that were filled out. Hayes said that he and other salesmen at Sterling Heights Dodge were trained to put their hand over parts of documents to hide numbers that might tip off a buyer that the accessories they had been led to believe cost $300 were actually costing them $1,500 or more.

How the program works

Chrysler employees retiree’ and eligible family members are entitled to buy a Chrysler, Plymouth, Dodge or Jeep/Eagle vehicle for the factory invoice price, minus dealer holdback, marketing and advertising costs.

Depending on the vehicle, the employee purchase price is generally about $2,000 below invoice.

While this is supposed to be a set price, employees still must make sure they are getting the discounts owed to them. The purchaser is solely responsible for making sure that he or she receives the employee discount Chrysler gives these instructions:

* Before going to a participating dealership, employees or retirees and eligible family members should obtain an employee purchase instruction guide and a “green sheet” purchase agreement form from Chrysler.

* These documents tell the purchasers that they are entitled to see a copy of the dealer’s factory invoice for the vehicle and that the employee price is listed on the invoice immediately following the “EP” code.

* The instructions tell the purchaser that the “computation of employee price” section of the employee purchase agreement when the vehicle is delivered

* The dealer is required to give the purchaser a completed and signed copy of the employee purchase agreement when the vehicle is delivered.

* While the purchase price of the vehicle is set by a formula, any dealer-installed options such as fabric protection or a sunroof the employee wants to buy are subject to haggling.

Car-buying tips

* Ask to see the original dealer invoice-not a copy, which could have been altered. Make sure you understand what the charges are.

* Be cautious when negotiating for dealer-installed options. If a sales person says he or she will throw in fabric protection, that doesn’t necessarily mean its being thrown in for free

* Get a detailed breakdown in writing of all vehicle costs, especially dealer installed options, such as fabric protection, a CD player or special trim.

* Keep track of how many documents the dealership has you sign and make sure you are given a copy of each. Pay close attention to a form from the Michigan Secretary of State’s Office, called RD108. This required form for a new vehicle purchase has a section that breaks. out dealer-install options and their “value amount which is the price you are being charged. Make sure this amount is the amount you agreed upon.

How to complain

The Michigan Secretary State’s Bureau of Automotive Regulation licenses and regulates dealers. Call 1-800 292-4204, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. weekdays.

© Detroit Free Press, 12-27-96.

Where the buyer of a car did not make all the payments and the seller wanted to repossess the car or collect the balance due, the car’s certificate of title is a security agreement under the Uniform Commercial Code -but the seller’s security interest is not necessarily limited to the price listed
on the title, the Michigan Court of Appeals has decided.

Instead, the certificate of title’s price which, in this case, was lower than the actual purchase price created “a question of fact as to the intended scope” of the seller’s I security interest, the court said.

In making its ruling, the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s finding that the title created a security agreement.

“The application for a certificate of title showed unequivocally that plaintiff was to have a security interest in the Corvette,” the Court of Appeals said.

However, the panel reversed the trial court’s ruling that the seller’s interest was limited to the amount listed on the title and that the seller’s interest was discharged.

“While the purchase price is listed as $500 on the title application, that figure is not necessarily a term of the security agreement itself,” the Court of Appeals said in a per curiam decision.

The published case is Roan v. Murray, Lawyers Weekly No. 26787 (4 pages). Court of Appeals judges Maureen P. Reilly and Mark J. Cavanagh were on the panel, along with Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Robert C. Anderson, who sat by assignment.

Court Not “Nitpicky”

This was a Judgment call. The court could have gone either way,” said Farmington Hills attorney Steve Lehto, who represents the seller. “I’m glad the court said there was a valid security interest here. Courts are often too ‘nitpicky’ about when an interest exists, when the code is actually quite liberal about it,” he said. However, Lehto said he was disappointed that the court did not let his client recover attorney fees. “There’s a practical problem here,” he stated. “My client has been forced to sue in order to get his money or the car back. By doing so, he’s running up attorney fees. I was hoping that there would be some interpretation by the court allowing for the recovery of attorney fees in such circumstances.” Lehto explained that under Michigan law “you can recover the reasonable expenses of retaking the collateral. Attorney fees should be part of that.” An appeal is unlikely, Lehto said, because there is “a dearth of Article 9 law in this state.”

Willing To Pay

Thomas Clemons, who represents the buyer, said that his client “has been willing to pay the money all along.” However, “the seller really wants the car back,” he asserted, noting that the buyer has “renovated the car and made significant improvements to it” since its purchase. “I think that the plaintiff feels that if he took the car and sold it he could offset some of his attorney fees,” the Algonac lawyer said. Clemons said that he does not plan to appeal the decision.

Sour Sale

Plaintiff James Roan sold defendant Steven Murray a 1968 Chevrolet Corvette for $3,500 in March 1987. The plaintiff was listed as the first secured party on the defendant’s application for the certificate = = tie, which was signed by the defendant. The panel said. purchase price listed on the title was $500.Therefore, the issue in this case was The parties had agreed that the defendant” whether the vehicle title application was would pay the plaintiff in interest-free installments. The defendant made “sporadic” $100 payments to the plaintiff until Aug. 2 I, 1989. At that time, the defendant had paid a total of $1,100 and did not make any additional payments. The plaintiff then sought the return of the car. Meanwhile, the defendant had made improvements to the car. The plaintiff filed a complaint against the defendant in January 1993. In the complaint the plaintiff argued that the application for certificate of title was a security agreement under §9-203 of the UCC.

The trial judge ruled that the plaintiff had a valid security agreement. However, the judge said that the plaintiff’s security interest was only for $500-the amount listed on the certificate of title. As a result, the plaintiffs interest had been extinguished because the defendant paid the plaintiff more than $500.

The trial court entered a money judgment for the plaintiff in the amount of $2,400 but ordered the plaintiff to execute a release of his security interest on the title of the car.

What Is Security Agreement?

On appeal, the plaintiff argued that the trial court improperly relied upon the defendant’s “false representation of the vehicle purchase price in the application for certificate of title to conclude that plaintiff’s security interest was limited to $500.”

However, the defendant claimed that the plaintiff did not establish “any enforceable security interest at all because the title application is insufficient to constitute the type of written security agreement required by §9203 of the UCC.”

The required components of a security agreement are “minimal” under the UCC, the Court of Appeals said.

“Article 9 defines ‘security agreement’ as ‘an agreement which creates or provides for a security interest,”‘ the court said.

Section 9-203(1) is “essentially a statute of frauds” and provides that “a security interest is not enforceable against a debtor and does not attach unless the secured party retains possession of the collateral or the agreement is in writing, signed bye the debtor and sufficient to create a security interest in the Corvette,” the court stated.

Title Creates Interest

The Court of Appeals then looked to other state court rulings, as well as Michigan statutes and case law, for guidance.

In White v. Household Finance Corp., 158 Ind. App. 394 (1973), the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled that “the application for certificate of title was not sufficient to create a security interest because it was not the agreement of the parties, but merely evidence that there may be an agreement,” the Court of Appeals explained.

But in Krieger v. Hartig, 11 Wash. App.898 (1974), the court held that “in view of the Code’s general policy to avoid technical formalities, the application for transfer of title was sufficient to create a security interest in compliance with §9-203,” the panel said.

Meanwhile, MCL 440.1201(3) provides that an “agreement” is “the bargain of the parties in fact as found in their language or by implication from other circumstances including course of dealing or usage of trade or course of performance as provided in this act (sections 1205 and 2208),” the Court of Appeals said.

Further, the Michigan Supreme Court “has recognized that, although a signed writing describing the collateral is required, the remainder of the ‘agreement’ under the UCC may be established by parole evidence of course of dealings, usage of trade, or course of performance,” the panel observed, citing NBD-Sandusky Bank v. Ritter, 437 Mich. 354 (1991).

In the present case, the application for certificate of title “showed unequivocally” that the plaintiff had a security interest in the car.

“Thus, we conclude that the title application constituted a security agreement which gave plaintiff a security interest in the vehicle,” the panel said.

Question Of Fact

“However,” the Court of Appeals continued, “while we hold that the trial court correctly concluded that defendant’s title certificate application was sufficient evidence of the UCC security agreement for purposes of §9203(1) of the we find that the trial court erred in ruling that plaintiff’s security interest is necessarily limited to $500 of the purchase price, which the parties agree was. $3,500.”

Although the purchase price was listed as $500 on the certificate of title, “that figure is not necessarily a term of the security agreement itself” the panel explained.

“Indeed, it is highly questionable whether a written security agreement needs to state any terms of the security agreement other than to sufficiently describe the collateral,” the court said, noting that “[a] security agreement is not required to state the amount of the debt secured.

“At most, the representation on the application that the purchase price was $500 creates only a question of fact as to the intended scope of plaintiff’s security interest, not a conclusive statement of the amount of security involved,” the Court of Appeals said.

In addition, “even if it were established that plaintiff’s security interest is limited to $500, we reject the briar court’s conclusion that defendant’s initial payment of $1,100 on the debt necessarily discharges plaintiff’s security interest,” the panel stated.

“It could be argued that defendant’s $1,100 in payments were made on the $3,000 of unsecured debt, and that none of the $500 of secured debt has yet been paid by defendant,” the court said.

“This interpretation seems more consistent with the parties’ actual course of conduct, as apparently neither party sought the removal of plaintiff’s lien on the title once $500 of the debt had been paid,” the Court of Appeals observed.

The court also addressed the plaintiff’s argument that he was entitled to repossession of the car under MCL 440.9503, which says, “[unless] otherwise agreed a secured party has on default the right to take possession of the collateral.”

“Because we find that the trial court erred in holding that plaintiff’s security interest had been extinguished and that a question of fact exists as to the extent of plaintiff’s interest, we direct the trial court to address this issue on remand,” the panel said.

‘We note that if plaintiff is entitled to repossession of the Corvette and he elects to retain it, he must provide written notice to defendant. Defendant will then have twenty-one days to object in writing, in which case plaintiff must dispose of the vehicle in a commercially reasonable manner and account to defendant for any surplus,” the Court of Appeals concluded.
© Michigan Lawyer’s Weekly, November 4, 1996

Who will defend these helpless cruisers? Attorney Steve Lehto, whose office is in Farmington Hills, to the rescue. After hearing about the over zealous police action, and the injustice at the not-so-dream cruise on the WCSX “JJ and the Morning Crew” show, Steve stepped in and offered to defend-free of charge-cruisers who faxed their plight to his office that morning. So far, Steve has gotten five or six of the 15 tickets he is handling, ranging from excessive noise, drag racing and reckless driving, reduced to a lesser charge.

We, and attorney Lehto, think it’s a good idea to obey all of the traffic laws at the Dream Cruise and never endanger yourself or anyone else. We were there for the entire event and never saw any reckless driving and very little tire squealing. Mostly just car lovers having a great time as we had.

Steve knows about cars, especially bad ones because his specialty is helping car owners who have lemons get their problems addressed. His office number is 855-0866. We on the WHEELS staff salute Steve and the judge who restored the spirit of that wonderful Dream Cruise.

There are two sources of protection which are of great interest to consumers: the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act and the Consumer Protection Act. Keep these in mind when ANY product you buy does not perform as it should. The Magnuson Moss Warranty Act (“The Act”) is a Federal law that protects buyers of virtually any goods sold in the US which came with an express written warranty. The law is sometimes called the “Federal Lemon Law” but do not think that it applies only to cars and trucks. It applies to any consumer goods which cost more than $25.00, if those goods came with a warranty. Under the Act, a manufacturer may designate its warranties as “Full” or “Limited,” but they must do so clearly. If a manufacturer, or someone else who is obligated under the warranty, fails to remedy a defect as spelled out in the warranty after a reasonable number of repair attempts, the Act requires the manufacturer to either refund the purchase price or replace the product.

If the manufacturer refuses to refund or replace as required by the Act, as they often do, you may have to file suit to get satisfaction. However, the law is very strong, and allows you to not only recover your damages, such as your purchase price, but also your attorney fees and court costs. This means that an attorney skilled in this area should be able to evaluate your situation and take your case without charging you anything out of your pocket for your fees.

The Consumer Protection Act also protects you when you buy something that doesn’t work, or when you get trick, misled or swindled in a transaction. This State law prohibits a whole laundry list of activities, some of which we have discussed in this column in the past. However, the most important for the purchasers of defective warrantied goods is the provision that makes it illegal to fail to provide “promised benefits.” The courts of this state have ruled that a warranty is a promised benefit, and that a manufacturer or seller that fails to honor its warranty is violating this section of the MCPA. Further, remember that a warranty is not a promise to work on your product; it’s a promise that they will fix it. This distinction is important, because otherwise, the seller could keep working on your boat or RV, never fix it right, and just waste your time in giving you the runaround.

The MCPA also allows for you to recover your damages (or $250, whichever is greater) as well as your attorney’s fees and costs. Again, This means that an attorney skilled in this area should be able to evaluate your situation and take your case without charging you anything out of your pocket for your fees.

These two laws have been used successfully by buyers of cars, trucks, boats, RV’s, motorcycles, personal watercraft, computers, appliances, furniture, and photocopiers which did not work right. Remember: it doesn’t have to be a car or truck. If you own any consumer product which is defective, these other laws will protect you.