FORT WORTH, Texas, Sept. 23, 2020 — A salesman for the Don Davis Auto Group allegedly made a “Faustian bargain” by trading honesty for a sales commission according to a new lawsuit.
The civil suit (Cause No. 067-309719-10) was filed in the 67th District Court of Tarrant County by Vehicle Safety Lawyer Todd Tracy on behalf of a Hurst, Texas businessman who suffered a catastrophic brain injury.
The lawsuit alleges that a salesman for the Don Davis Auto Group of Arlington, Texas, made a deceitful sale and lied about purported safety features that did not exist in a Toyota Tundra pickup truck.
The Tarrant County lawsuit seeks more than 70-million dollars in damages alleging that misrepresented safety features were used in order to entice 45-year old Todd Arnold into buying the Toyota pickup truck.
Mr. Arnold suffered catastrophic brain damage when the roof of his 2011 Toyota Tundra Truck crushed his head and face during a minor single-vehicle accident because the truck’s roof peeled back like a cheap tomato can.
Todd Arnold purchased the vehicle for an employee to use in his pesticide business. The lawsuit accuses the salesman of the Don Davis Auto Group of lying and misrepresenting that the Toyota Tundra was built with revolutionary new “super steel.”
The salesman fraudulently claimed that the super steel “made the truck super strong, especially in the area where people sat” according to the lawsuit.
Sadly, an expert engineering analysis conducted by automotive engineers, including one who helped design the Dodge Viper and Ford GT supercar, found that there was no “super steel” in the Toyota truck to protect Mr. Arnold from catastrophic brain damage.
“How do you know when a salesman for Don Davis Auto Group is lying about the Toyota Tundra? His lips are moving,” said vehicle safety lawyer Todd Tracy who represents Arnold and his family. “Unfortunately, the salesman’s nose did not grow like Pinocchio as his lies tricked Mr. Arnold into buying the truck,” said Tracy.
Todd Arnold was riding in the front passenger seat of his Toyota Tundra when it struck a wood post on a barbed-wire fence. The roof peeled back like a folded accordion into Mr. Arnold’s face and head. His wife, who was driving, sustained a minor injury. His teenage daughter and her friend seated in the back seat slept thru the accident.
At the time of the purchase, the salesman for Don Davis Auto Group told a “whopper” of a lie stating that the Toyota Tundra was “the safest truck ever built” according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit accuses the salesman of Don Davis Auto Group of fabricating a story that the Toyota Tundra was safer and tougher than any Chevrolet, Ford, or Ram truck.
The truth is that comparison testing performed in the lawsuit showed that the strength rating of the steel in the Tundra was less than that of the Ford F-150, Chevrolet Silverado, and the Dodge Ram.
Crash tests conducted in the lawsuit also proved that the salesman had lied because the Toyota Tundra truck performed worse than trucks made by Chevy, Ford, and Dodge.
An honest person can only conclude that the salesman for Don Davis Auto simply concocted a lie “that Toyota used ‘super steel'” to close a car deal according to the lawsuit.
Words matter.
“The cock and bull story used by the Don Davis Auto Group to defraud Mr. Arnold confirms the sleazy reputation of car dealers behaving like ‘snake oil salesmen,'” said Tracy.
