Posted on 05/28/2011 10:56:22 AM PDT by Ken H
US government refuses to pay damages for Ferrari F50 destroyed during an FBI joy ride.
The US Department of Justice is deploying all of its legal muscle to avoid paying the price after an FBI agent destroyed an exotic car during a joy ride. After nearly two years of trying to recover the money owed by the government, Motors Insurance Company filed a lawsuit against the government seeking the full $750,000 value of the wrecked 1995 Ferrari F50.
The vehicle originally had been stolen in 2003 from a Ferrari dealer in Pennsylvania. Motors paid the $630,000 insurance claim, giving the firm title to the missing exotic. On August 12, 2008, the FBI stumbled upon the car in Kentucky during a separate investigation. The agency held the vehicle with permission from Motors. On May 27, 2009, FBI Special Agent Frederick C. Kingston got behind the wheel of a 1995 Ferrari F50 with by Assistant US Attorney J. Hamilton Thompson in the passenger seat.
"Just a few seconds after we left the parking lot, we went around a curve, and the rear of the car began sliding," Thompson wrote in an email to Managing Assistant US Attorney E.J. Walbourn on the day of the incident. "The agent tried to regain control, but the car fishtailed and slid sideways up onto the curb. The vehicle came to rest against a row of bushes and a small tree. Both myself and the agent exited of our own power."
A claims adjuster noted the frame was bent, rendering the vehicle -- now worth $750,000 in working condition -- a total loss. DOJ began stonewalling when Motors tried to get information about what happened. The agency refused to honor a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for any documents regarding the storage and use of the vehicle on the day of the accident. The request was denied as "an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy." Motors filed a separate lawsuit to force the disclosure of agency records concerning the Ferrari.
"Based on the denial of Motors Insurance Company's claim, plaintiff anticipates that DOJ and FBI will claim immunity against civil liability under 28 USC Section 2680(c) and assert that the vehicle was damaged while in the detention of law enforcement authorities," Motors attorney Richard C. Kraus wrote in an April 14 lawsuit. "The information requested under FOIA and withheld by DOJ and FBI will be necessary to determine whether 28 USC Section 2680(c) applies."
That is precisely what DOJ has done. The agency insists sovereign immunity prohibits the suit, and no negligence claim can arise because federal law prohibits claims against the government for goods damaged while detained by law enforcement.
"The exception applies to bar suit against the United States and does not permit litigation over the reasonableness of the law enforcement officer's conduct in question," Assistant Attorney General Tony West wrote in a May 9 brief to the court. "The broad interpretation of the detention-of-goods exception, coupled with the necessity that the court construe the United States' waiver of sovereign immunity strictly in favor of the sovereign, require a finding that the United States has not consented to this sort of suit and plaintiff has failed to state a claim under federal law. Accordingly, the United States respectfully requests that the above-captioned action be dismissed with prejudice."
US District Judge Avern Cohn on Tuesday set a June 22 date for final briefs on the government's motion to dismiss the suit.
They can be when a "Sudden Acceleration Incident" manifests
can I get some Peta meat with that car?
Sure, I guess. As long as the engine, which is also a stressed member of the frame, was unharmed. You could ask Ferrari to lay up another carbon-fiber frame for you. Probably wouldn’t cost more than a half million or so.
If it’s an aluminum frame it probably is. There aren’t hardly any places here that are qualified to fix unibody aluminum frames. Plus Ferarri may have said this kind of damage requires THEM to fix it and that would mean back to Italy with the car.
Collision damage was on the driver's side. "Frederick" was the driver. He was hospitalized in Lexington, KY and received stitches on his head, due to breaking out the driver's side glass with it.
True dat. Holder’s gotta back up his personal army, so I imagine the race of these two is irrelevant: They’re simply thugs.
True dat. Holder’s gotta back up his personal army, so I imagine the race of these two is irrelevant: They’re simply thugs.
Pretty serious underbody and suspension damage, from the looks of that rear wheel. It appears to have been pushed back several inches.
Oh well, such things happen while safely transporting evidence. Who knew high-centering a Ferrari on a sidewalk and popping a tree with the driver's side door would do such a thing? Certainly not the FBI. Must've had bald tires. Yep, that's it. Bald tires have been known to cause even 200 hp cars to spin wildly out of control on dry pavement at 35 to 45 mph. /s
Does use of the term “Holder’s People” mean you think they are Black? It may surprise you, but Blacks do not have a monopoly on stupidity, and the FBI and DOJ can always manage to be institutionally arrogant no matter the skin color of the employees involved.
Wonder if they towed it to Pick-a-Part?
Somebody mentioned the term “Holder’s People,” and that has come to mean black people. I suggest that should be extended to the thugs that keep this bunch in power. But Holder himself caused the term to be coined when he assured “his people” he would err in their favor at DOJ. Don’t blame me.
Unfortunately for Big Government, Big Insurance has the money & lawyers to do battle.
Dial 788-9122
'n we'll come git 'at cor fer yew.
Ain't 'at a purty song?
The "song" and dialog are from their actual radio and television commercials, lol.
“There aren’t hardly any places here that are qualified to fix unibody aluminum frames. Plus Ferarri may have said this kind of damage requires THEM to fix it and that would mean back to Italy with the car.”
It depends on what you mean by “here”. There are places that are qualified to fix unibody aluminum frames and I work directly with them on a regular basis here in Scottsdale. Their technicians were trained at various factories (for example, Audi). There’s no magic to it with the proper training, tools, and isolation techniques (to eliminate contamination of the aluminum with steel). True, Farrari may have said this kind of damage requires them to fix it, although even with transport costs it takes a lot to total a 750K vehicle on an economic basis, although vehicles are sometimes totaled for other reasons besides economics.
“This car is an exceedingly limited production car, and is basically a racecar with just the minimum required to make it street legal. This is not a Camry.”
I appreciate you clearing that up. I must have overlooked it in my 36 years of auto physical damage appraisal and supervison.
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