Ford Motor Co.
’s shares slid nearly 5% in morning trading Monday, following news of a $1.7 billion jury verdict involving a fatal rollover accident in one of its older-model heavy-duty trucks.
A jury in Georgia on Friday reached the verdict after a three-week trial, determining punitive damages should be imposed on
Ford
F -4.98%
for selling 5.2 million Super Duty trucks that the plaintiffs’ lawyers argued had dangerously weak roofs vulnerable to collapsing in a rollover crash.
Ford’s stock, trading at about $15.12 a share Monday morning, fell more sharply than the broader market.
The lawsuit, brought by the children of the victims who died in the crash, centered on a 2014 accident in which a couple driving a 2002 Ford F-250 truck were killed when the right front tire blew out and the pickup rolled over. The victims, Melvin and Voncile Hill, were crushed inside the truck, according to court records.
“While our sympathies go out to the Hill family, we don’t believe the verdict is supported by the evidence, and we plan to appeal,” Ford said Sunday. “In the meantime, we aren’t going to litigate this matter through the news media.”
The verdict is believed to be one of Georgia’s largest and puts a spotlight on other older-model Super Duty trucks sold by Ford over a roughly 17-year period that the plaintiffs’ lawyers have argued have a similar roof design.
In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs’ attorneys allege that Super Duty trucks sold through the 1999-2016 model years had defectively designed roofs and Ford knew of the dangers posed at the time. The lawyers pointed to evidence they said showed that the trucks failed internal company testing and that in 2004, Ford developed a stronger roof but didn’t use it in sellable pickups until the 2017 model year, according to court documents.
Ford has identified 162 lawsuits and 83 similar incidents of roof crush in 1999-2016 Super Duty trucks, according to the pre-trial order.
Ford contends that Mr. Hill, the driver of the F-250 truck involved in the accident, improperly steered the vehicle after the tire ruptured, causing it to leave the roadway at a dangerous angle, the court records show.
Ford also said that the tire on the truck had the incorrect load-carrying capacity, which led it to fail, and the Hills had improperly used their seat belts, according to the court documents.
Often, high-dollar verdicts such as this one are later reduced by judges or the appeals court.
Write to Nora Eckert at nora.eckert@wsj.com
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