MCALLEN, Texas - A Texas family who sued Bridgestone/Firestone for devastating injuries suffered when their Ford Explorer flipped over following a tire blowout has settled the case for an undisclosed sum, a U.S. judge said on Friday.
"The parties have reached a settlement for an undisclosed amount," U.S. District Court Judge Filemon Vela said.
Sources close to the case said it was settled for $7.5 million. The settlement came on the fourth day of jury deliberations.
It was the first of about 400 suits against the beleaguered company whose tires have been linked to auto crashes causing 203 deaths and 700 serious injuries in the U.S.
The plaintiffs in the case, the Rodriguez family of Pharr, Texas, had sought $1 billion in damages.
Firestone's former corporate partner Ford Motor Co. also was a defendant in the case, but had earlier settled with the plaintiffs for $6 million. Firestone is the U.S. unit of Japan's Bridgestone Corp. .
Physician Joel Rodriguez sued after his family had an accident while driving on a Mexican highway in March of last year. His wife Marisa, 39, was left with brain damage and is wheelchair-bound. Rodriguez, his brother, and three-year-old son were also seriously injured.
The family alleged that Firestone skimped on materials and hid early indications of problems with the tire's design.
In most of the accidents linked to Firestone, the tires were installed on Ford's popular Explorer sport utility vehicles, which has sparked a vicious war of words between the long-time corporate partners, who blame each other for the crashes.
Firestone said it was glad that it was able to reach a settlement with the Rodriguez family.
"Since the outset, when we provided financial assistance to help with the family's medical bills, we have been hopeful that we could reach a fair settlement that would also bring closure to them following this accident," Firestone said in a statement.
"As in many other cases we have resolved out of court, we see this as a reflection of the responsibility we feel for all Bridgestone/Firestone products and the people who use them," the statement concluded.
Rodriguez family attorney Richard Garcia declined to comment on the terms of the settlement.
Firestone had mainly focused during the trial on the performance of the Ford Explorer, he said.
"Ford will have to decide how vigorously it is going to defend the Explorer or continue to resolve the cases," he said.
Ford had no comment on the settlement. "We don't have a comment on this case as we weren't part of the litigation," spokeswoman Kathleen Vokes said.
Throughout the trial, which began Aug. 13, attorneys for the Rodriguez family charged that the tires were shoddily built, which they blamed on Bridgestone's aging Decatur, Illinois, tire factory. The company in June said it was closing the plant, where all the defective tires were built.
Along with attempting to pin the blame on the Explorer, Firestone lawyers also said the Rodriguez's tire was not defective when it left the plant, but had been weakened when the tire struck a rock several thousand miles before the blowout.
Firestone recalled 6.5 million ATX, ATXII, and Wilderness AT tires last August in one of the largest U.S. product recalls in history. Before the trial, the company, which already has taken $570 million in charges related to the tires, had reached out-of-court settlements in about 150 lawsuits.
Ford, which is named along with Firestone in hundreds of lawsuits, followed in May with its own recall of 13 million Firestone Wilderness AT tires at a cost of $3 billion.
The automaker said the tires had a "substantial failure risk." Firestone refused to participate in the recall and angrily broke off a nearly 100-year agreement to supply tires for Ford cars.
