Runaway Toyotas. How long has Toyota known about the issue of uncontrolled acceleration and why haven't we heard about it before this. ABC News has been investigating the runaway cars for some time. Some sources say that a revealing ABC investigative report is the reason that Toyota finally took action and issued a recall and an apology. But is it too little too late and can they salvage their now tarnished reputation? Is it really possible that Toyota kept quiet with the reportedly 2000 complaints from owners about uncontrolled acceleration because of the financial ramifications. And if so, what might be the now looming legal ramifications.

My guest for this episode was Houston attorney Terry Bryant and I asked him to talk with us about the legal ramifications of the Toyota recall and the way it has been handled.

According to Terry "for a long time we've thought Toyota was a very reputable company who produced very good products without much problem. However over the last few days we've seen issues with the accelerator and brakes on a couple of their models. The problem with these particular issues is that they can cause severe injuries or even death to the occupants of their vehicles."

Bryant went on to say "this is going to be a good example of how the judicial system will work in order to effect change in the automotive industry. That is when people discover that there are problems with their vehicles and are able to bring legal action against the big auto manufacturers then they're able to effect change on a very significant basis. If we didn't have the media or the judicial system, I'm not sure that the information about Toyota ever would have come out. I don't think we can depend on the government regulators to enforce the standards that they've set for the automotive industry. I think it will play out because there will be a number of lawsuits and each individual case will be handled differently around the different state courts in this country."

"A class action may be appropriate for persons that have had trouble with their vehicle but have not sustained any injury. In other words they have not had a crash. The class action would help compensate them for the time and trouble it takes to get their car repaired or deal with a recall. Those probably individually are not very significant but will help with the safety of the vehicles. "