Attorney Discusses Row Between Ford, Bridgestone-Firestone
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: We're going to turn our focus again to the very public rift between Firestone and Ford. As we reported, Ford is expected to announce plans today to replace millions more of Firestone tires, specifically the Wilderness AT tires. Joining us now for more on this is attorney Tab Turner. He is a lawyer in some 30 lawsuits against Firestone and Ford over the alleged tire defects. And he joins us right now from Dallas. Mr. Turner, thanks for being here. If, indeed, there is a replacement announced again today of more of these tires, what does that tell you?</s>C. TAB TURNER, ATTORNEY: Well, it tells us what we've been saying all along, which is these tires are bad regardless of which plant, whether they were made in Decatur, Illinois, or whether they were made at the other plants. They're all the same design, they're all manufactured the same way, and they're all defective.</s>MCEDWARDS: The company's doing its job, though, isn't it?</s>TURNER: Yes, this is very good. There's no question about it. Ford ought to be applauded for having step forward. The only real question is why they didn't step forward earlier than they did.</s>MCEDWARDS: Is it possible that there's a new problem with this next group of tires, or does your information tell you it's the same issue?</s>TURNER: No, it's the same issue. These tires peel apart. It's called a tread separation or a belt-leaving-the-belt situation. And the problem is identical whether they're 15-inch tires or 16-inch Wilderness tires. It's all caused by the same thing, which is a design flaw in the design of the tire.</s>MCEDWARDS: Is it the tires, Mr. Turner, because this question keeps coming up? Is it the tires? Is it the nature of the Ford Explorer? And to what extent does the role of the driver play in some of these accidents?</s>TURNER: Well, obviously, every one of these vehicles is operated by a driver. Every vehicle in the country that moves across the highway is. So that's something that's common to all of these vehicles. The thing that's unique about this situation is that we have a combination of bad tires on bad vehicles. And when you have a tire failure on a Ford Explorer, especially a tread separation at highway speeds, this vehicle is virtually impossible to control, and it ends up rolling over. And, you know, the auto manufacturers and the tire manufactures provide you with five tires on your car. They give you a spare tire, and they expect you to be able to pull over to the side of the road and change your tire if you have some sort of a blowout or a tread separation. The unique characteristic of this situation is that the Explorer is extremely difficult to control, and unless you're an expert driver, you're in a lot of trouble if your tread peels apart.</s>MCEDWARDS: So what do you make of this blame game, as someone described it, that's going on between Firestone and Ford, and the severing of their almost-100-year-long relationship?</s>TURNER: Well, you know, this has been a combination of a bad tire and a bad car from the outset, and it's been very difficult for these companies to continue to walk down this path arm and arm because it is a situation where you can't really separate these two, one from the other, with regard to the cause of these problems and the deaths that have been suffered across the country. And it was inevitable that at some point in time they were going to begin to butt heads. It's just, you know, the timing of exactly how this is transpired and the fact that Ford is the one that's going to get the tires, instead of Firestone, is kind of interesting, that it ended up that way.</s>MCEDWARDS: Inevitable, you say, but they began to butt heads. But what about the implications for the companies individually?</s>TURNER: Well, you know, the implications from a legal standpoint, and that's really all I can address well -- you know, I guess I could make a comment on the public relations aspect of it as well as anybody could as well -- but from a legal standpoint, this is not going to effect the lawsuits in any manner. The one thing that it does do for all of us is that it ensures that it's the hot weather. The summer begins to creep up on us again. Hopefully, we'll have all of these tires off of these vehicles by the time we get into June and we won't be seeing people dying and people suffering as a result of these tires coming apart on these bad vehicles.</s>MCEDWARDS: Attorney Tab Turner, thanks very much for your thoughts, your analysis, this morning. Appreciate it.</s>TURNER: Thanks. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com