A Columbus jury rendered a “phase 2” verdict Friday of $2.5 billion in punitive damages in a case against the Ford Motor Company, according to a news release from Butler Prather LLP, a Columbus-based law firm.
The case, Brogdon (Mills) v. Ford Motor Company, involved the deaths of Herman and Debra Mills, who died as a result of their injuries after their 2015 Ford F250 “Super Duty” truck rolled over and the roof crushed down on them in August 2022 in Decatur County, according to the news release.
The Mills were founders of Mills Welding & Fabrication Services and retired in 2019, according to the release.
The release says the Mills truck left the road, hit a culvert covered by tall grass, vaulted into the air, struck on its front and then flopped over. The roof collapsed into the passenger compartment, the release says.
The release says Debra Mills died at the scene and Herman Mills died nine days later in a Tallahassee, Florida, hospital.
The release says, “The roofs on all 1999-2016 “Super Duty” trucks are indisputably weak.” The release claims those trucks have a strength-to-weight rating (SWR) of 1.1 when the minimum SWR rating to get a “good” roof strength rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is 4.0.
“Ford contended that the roofs on the 1999-2016 ‘Super Duty’ trucks are ‘absolutely safe’ and there was nothing wrong with them,” the release says. The release says, “Ford also contended, as it has for decades, that roof strength doesn’t matter — that there is no ‘causal relationship’ between roof strength and injuries in rollover wrecks.”
The release also states, “That argument has been rejected by the federal government agency charged with automotive safety, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (“NHTSA”), and by the IIHS.”
The lawsuit was filed May 23, 2023, by James E. “Dusty” Brogdon and his brothers Ronald B. “Rusty” Brogdon and Jason Mills, according to the release. The release says the case was filed in the Columbus Division of the Middle District of Georgia because James E. Brogdon lives in Harris County.
The case was tried in the United States District Court, Middle District of Georgia, Columbus Division, before U.S. District Judge Clay Land.
This phase 2 verdict comes after the the jury rendered its phase 1 compensatory damages verdict Thursday for $30.5 million, according to the release.
“Ford has known for 26 years that people were getting killed and hurt by these weak roofs,” James “Jim” Butler Jr., lead counsel for the Mills family, said in the news release. “Ford has constantly refused to admit the danger or warn of the risk.”
“We were very pleased to be able to help the Mills family,” Ramsey Prather, co-counsel for the Mills family, said in the news release. “Perhaps this verdict will serve to do what Ford refuses to do — warn American citizens of the danger.”
The Ledger-Enquirer didn’t reach a Ford Motor Company official for comment before publication.
This story comes to GPB through a reporting partnership with Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.
