Like a Pesky Neighbor, State Farm Is There -- Again
By Michelle Krebs February 9, 2010State Farm insurance warned U.S. regulators repeatedly of a rise in vehicle-accident claims 
involving Toyota vehicles and uninntended acceleration as far back as 2007, according to various media reports coming out of Washington Tuesday, a day before Toyota's top U.S. executive is scheduled to testify before the House oversight committee.
The nation's largest auto insurer saw an increase in reports of unwanted acceleration in Toyotas from its database of 40 million customers and told the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NTHSA) in 2007, the company confirmed.
Interestingly, State Farm also was first to sound the alarm on the deadly rollovers of Ford Explorers with Firestone tires in 2000.
"When you start to see significant claims activity that indicates that there may be widespread problems with a product, that's when you go to the NHTSA," company spokesman Kip Diggs told Reuters. "There had to have been significant activity, a
noticeable trend, for that to happen."
In 2000, State Farm reported to NHTSA the connection it was seeing in claims involving Firestone tires and the Ford Explorer. Its reports fell on deaf ears then as well.
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Dang, this sure does make it that much harder to prove that it's just dumb drivers seeing media coverage and unfairly blaming Toyota. Afterall, State Farm can compare Toyota vs. all makes and hard to claim only Toyota drivers thought to do this, especially when there was little media coverage back then.
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