Old convictions, new questions as car flaws raise crash doubts - Standard-Examiner

Lakisha Ward-Green spent three months in jail after she lost control of her Chevrolet Cobalt, killing her teenage passenger. The new evidence: the February 2014 recall by General Motors of 2. 6 million cars for defective ignition switches. With a record 64 million vehicles recalled in the United States last year, many of them after being on the road for a decade or more, experts expect an increasing number of proceedings over wrongful convictions to emerge. An examination of court filings has identified at least four such challenges in the case of GM’s recall and one in the case of Toyota. In the case of GM’s defective ignition switch, the company knew of the problem for about a decade before it issued a public notice. “Just about everyone who is in jail in a case where there wasn’t clear evidence of driving under the influence or another wrongful act will try to get out using the ‘ignition switch made me do it’ defense,” Gordon said in an email. In the case of Ward-Green, she was giving 16-year-old friend Robert Chambers a lift home from school in September 2010 when her car’s ignition suddenly went into the accessory position, cutting off power to the steering and brakes, according to... Source: www.standard.net