On December 20, 2010, NHTSA announced new and larger fines against Toyota for its failure to handle recalls properly:
WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood today announced that Toyota Motor Corporation has agreed to pay an additional $32.425 million in civil penalties as the result of two separate investigations into the automaker's handling of auto recalls. Toyota will pay the maximum fines allowable under the law - $16.375 million in one case and $16.050 million in the other - in response to the Department's assertion that it failed to comply with the requirements of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act for reporting safety defects to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
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The second investigation completed today resulted in a $16.050 million fine. In that case, NHTSA investigated whether Toyota properly notified the agency of a safety defect in several Toyota models that could result in the loss of steering control. In 2004, Toyota conducted a recall in Japan for Hilux trucks with steering relay rods prone to fatigue cracking and breaking, causing the vehicle to lose steering control. At that time, Toyota informed NHTSA that the safety defect was isolated to vehicles in Japan and that the company had not received similar field information within the United States. In 2005, however, Toyota informed NHTSA that the steering relay rod defect was present in several models sold in the U.S. and conducted a recall for nearly one million vehicles. Then, in May 2010, NHTSA was alerted to additional information, including complaints from U.S. consumers, that Toyota had not disclosed when Toyota initially notified NHTSA that a U.S. recall was unnecessary.
But what is human safety really worth to Toyota? Compare the $32 million in fines thus far with Toyota's quarterly profits: for example, "the world's largest auto maker by sales, posted a net profit of 153.2 billion yen ($1.68 billion) in the three months through December" of last year! {source}
For Toyota, loss of and injury to human life is easily affordable.
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