So many months have passed by with the runaway Prius in California. I am wondering what happened to James A. Sikes who was being charged back in March. Did California drop the charge? Did Toyota paid him to close this case? Anyone knows?
I think that he was determined to be a liar... but I am not able to find hard proof of that, as such, here is what I did find, on the Wiki: James Sikes alleged unintended acceleration case On March 8, 2010, a 2008 Prius allegedly uncontrollably accelerated to 94 miles per hour on a California Highway (US), and the Prius had to be stopped with the verbal assistance of the California Highway Patrol as news cameras watched.[152] The incident received national news coverage, with initial reporting including inaccurate information about the event, such as the claim that a CHP car was used to physically block Sikes' vehicle.[153][154] Subsequent investigations uncovered suspicious information about the alleged runaway Prius driver, 61-year old James Sikes, including being US$19,000 behind in his Prius car payments and with $US700,000 in accumulated [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt"]debt[/ame].[155][156] Sikes stated he wanted a new car as compensation for the incident.[155][157] Analyses by Edmunds.com and [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbes"]Forbes[/ame] found Sikes' acceleration claims and fears of shifting to neutral implausible, with Edmunds concluding that "in other words, this is BS",[158] and Michael Fumento in Forbes analyzing Sikes's claims related to the mechanics of his Prius and his own contradictions, such as saying he didn't want to take his hands off the steering wheel to shift into neutral even though he held a cell phone in his hand almost the entire time, comparing it to the [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balloon_boy_hoax"]balloon boy hoax[/ame].[156] Further government investigator tests on Sikes's Prius reportedly showed that the brake wear were consistent with intermittent braking, not constant hard braking as he claimed.[159] Sikes also reportedly had a history of false police reports, suspect insurance claims, theft and fraud allegations, and television aspirations.[155] These findings raised questions about "the credibility of Mr. Sikes' reporting of events" in a Congressional memo.[160] This was all found here: 2009
I doubt he will be charged unless he tries a lot harder to extort Toyota. Toyota wouldn't want the publicity of Sikes extending his 15 minutes of fame, and the state won't waste resources trying to nail him with a false 911 call. Just look at the clueless people here that believe Sikes. The chances of a jury conviction are very slim.
I heard that in an act of self flagellant remorse over a badly executed attempt at fraud he purchased a Nissan Cube and is now spending his time cleansing seabirds of Oil Spill damage using Dawn Liquid Soap and micro-fiber towels imprinted with the words "Sorry Toyota". But my sources are often wrong.
I think the same as the earlier poster, that Toyota will not pursue Sikes for fraud to avoid anti-japanese backlash. Unfortunate, really.
He's $700,000 in debt and someone gave him a new car loan for over 19k? No wonder why banks are suffering, bad loans...
That's the problem with those darned hybrids: you run out of fuel and they *still* keep accelerating. Your only recourse is to aim for a blind pedestrian. Tom
No. He was $19,000 behind in payments. The loan is probably more than $19k (Assuming he did pay some)
