Yes we all know Toyota is going through probably the worst crisis ever in their history. The press and the public is hypersensitive about anything Toyota right now.
For goodness sake I posted yesterday coming down on the side of Toyota and was immediately chastised as being critical of the automaker. Come on , I'm not that bad. It is true I am no fan of the company, however I do have a healthy respect for them. So when we had two case of two runaway Prius models in two days It really raised my concerns.
I had known that was going to happen I should have been in Vegas playing my odds. Now at first the San Diego runaway incident seem pretty clear cut. The video of the 911 call sure sounded damning. But again what are the odds of two runaway events in the midst of a huge public investigation? Something isn't right.
With no errors codes giving a trail of deception, it seemed to be pretty easy to fake such an event if there was ample motivation and if we had a competent driver. I voiced my concerns with the Spies and we took a wait and see attitude. After all this was getting press everywhere, and we would simply be piling on. In the mean time Jim Sikes the heroic driver of the out of control Prius, started appearing all over the evening news.
Was a case being built?
Our good friends over at Jalopnik must have been on the same trail and went as far as file a public record search on Mr Sikes. This uncovered an mountain of debt to the tune of $700,000 and a certain Toyota Prius that appears to be 5 month behind on payments. Hmm, the same Prius that almost killed him?
While I am in no way implying Mr Sikes did anything other than be in a car careening down the highway at 90 mph, it seems the rest of this story remains to be told.
Who is the REAL victim here, Mr Sikes or perhaps my Japanese nemesis? You tell us!
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