Report: 1,000 cases of sudden acceleration

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 8 (UPI) -- Instances of Toyota and Lexus vehicles accelerating suddenly have been reported more than 1,000 times since 2001, documents indicate.

A review of federal records performed by the Los Angeles Times and published Sunday revealed that the crashes, in which cars slammed into trees, parked cars, brick walls and other obstacles, resulted in at least 19 deaths and scores of injuries.

Complaints from consumers over sudden acceleration among Toyota and Lexus vehicles has resulted in at least eight investigations by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in the last seven years, two of which resulted in the recalls of 85,000 cars, the newspaper said.

But, it reported, the six NTSB cases closed as "no defect" specifically excluded or dismissed most of the sudden acceleration complaints about the cars.

For instance, the Times cited a 2003 Lexus NTSB probe in which the agency threw out all but one of 37 customer complaints cited in a defect petition. But the newspaper said it found records of 19 fatalities involving Toyota and Lexus vehicles from the same model years in which sudden or unintended acceleration may have been a factor that was not considered.