CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas -- A jury ordered Ford Motor Co. to pay $106.8 million in damages to a couple whose daughter was fatally burned when a drunken driver smashed into the rear of her Mustang II.
A state district court jury, after an eight-week trial, Tuesday found Ford negligent and assessed $106.8 million in actual and punitive damages.
Ford was expected to appeal the decision.
Devary Durrill, 19, suffered burns over 80 percent of her body in 1978 when her 1974 Mustang II, parked on the shoulder of a highway, was struck by a Lincoln Continental going 75 mph.
Miss Durrill's car burst into flames and she died a week later. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. William Durrill of Corpus Christi, filed suit.
The Durrills' attorney, David Perry, argued the fire could have been avoided if Ford had rounded off sharp bolts in the differential of the car. He said the bolts punctured the gas tank, causing the fire.
Ford lawyer Lewin Plunkett argued that no car on the road is designed to withstand a 75-mph rear-end collision and that the Mustang II was in compliance with federal safety standards.
The driver of the Lincoln, James Rathnall, now 69, was convicted in 1979 of driving while intoxicated and sentenced to two years on state prison in the death of Bonnie Watkins, a passenger in Miss Durrill's car.
Ford was acquitted in an earlier trial involving one of their cars that exploded after being rear-ended.
A Winamac, Ind., jury on March 13, 1980, decided Ford was innocent of reckless homicide charges in the deaths of three teenage girls whose 1973 Pinto exploded in a rear-end collision with a van on Aug. 10, 1978.
