Toyota hit by California lawsuit

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Toyota has recalled more than eight million vehicles globally to address the risk that accelerator pedals on a range of its vehicles could become stuck because of a loose floor mat or a mechanical glitch in the pedal assembly.

Unintended acceleration in the company's Toyota and Lexus vehicles has been linked to at least five US crash deaths since 2007. Authorities are investigating reports alleging 47 other fatalities over the past decade.

Orange County is just north of San Diego County, where a California Highway Patrol trooper and three members of his family were killed in a crash last August involving a Toyota vehicle.

That crash, which Toyota has said appears to have been caused by a loose floor mat, prompted the first in a series of accelerator-related recalls by Toyota and drew new scrutiny to a rising trend of consumer complaints about unintended acceleration from US safety regulators.

Toyota has its US sales headquarters in nearby Torrance, California.

Toyota executives have been visiting dealers across the United States this week in a bid to focus attention on a campaign of aggressive discounts credited with sending sales sharply higher in March.

Toyota Senior Vice President for US sales, Don Esmond, told Reuters on Friday that the automaker's US sales were up 40% from a year earlier through the first 10 days of March.

He said the automaker had not decided whether to extend unprecedented incentives, including rebates and dealer incentives of up to USD 4,000 and zero-percent financing into April, a move analysts say could stoke sales at the expense of profit margins.

"We will continue to keep our dealers competitive," Esmond said.