PREPARED STATEMENT

OF

TIMOTHY F . SCANLON

ATTORNEY AT LAW SCCANLON & GEA RINGER CO . , L . P . A .

AKRON , OHIO

To The Members of The Sub - Committee :

I am grateful for the opportunity to appear before you

I

am

today , to share with you my feelings about the extremely serious

risk created by the 3 - wheel all - terrain vehicles .

This risk has

rec

en

Sur

only recently been given the attention and exposure which it deserves . Unfortunately , the public has begun to be made

aware of this risk only because of the increasing number

of

shocking tragedies - brain injuries ,

paralysis and death

- that

are far too often the by - product of riding these motorized

tricycles .

My understanding

of the danger presented by this product

was

ma

was

began in the spring of 1981 , when I first met John McKinley . John was then a 29 year old , married construction worker , father of two young children , who was a C - 5 quadriplegic ( paralyzed from his nipple level down ) as a result of being thrown from a Honda 110 3 - wheeled all - terrain vehicle on October 6 , 1979 . In October , 1981 , on behalf of John and his wife , Terri , who is with us today , I filed a product liability case

S

re

against the Japanese and American Honda Companies which had

manufactured and imported this vehicle into this country .

When we began that case , all of us connected with it had no

real understanding as to why John ' s accident had occurred .

We

were probably motivated primarily by a " gut " feeling that what happened should not have happened - because John was operating this vehicle on exactly the kind of terrain on which , and in exactly the manner in which , Honda could reasonably have expected it to be operated . Our case was based upon our belief that John had been injured not because of any fault or unusual behavior on