LI crashes figure in Jeep Grand Cherokee probe

Three Long Island accidents involving Jeep Grand Cherokees are among those that prompted a federal investigation begun during the summer into allegations by auto safety activists that the fuel tank location in 3.1 million of the SUVs built between 1993 and 2004 makes them vulnerable in crashes to gasoline tank ruptures and fires.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said at least 55 people have died in 44 crashes involving the Jeeps in question in which fire was the "most harmful event, including one in Bridgehampton and another in Hauppauge.

It says only 10 crashes with 13 fatalities of Jeep occupants appear at this point to be associated with the allegedly defective gasoline tank location behind the rear axle - not including any of the Long Island crashes.

But the Center for Auto Safety, which formally petitioned for the federal probe last year, attributes 76 deaths to fires caused by the alleged defect, including 13 in vehicles that collided with the Jeeps and, it believes, including the three Long Island cases.

Based in Washington, the group was founded by Ralph Nader and was instrumental in getting Ford Pintos recalled for a fuel system design prone to fires.

"It's really the Pinto for soccer moms," the center's executive director, Clarence Ditlow, said about the Grand Cherokee design in question. "It's a bad vehicle."

Chrysler has defended the vehicle's safety record but said it will cooperate with the investigation.

Two of the crashes occurred on Route 27 in 1999, one in Bridgehampton on Sept. 1 and another in East Moriches the following day, and each involved one fatality, according to police and federal investigators.

The third occurred Jan. 26 last year on the Long Island Expressway in Hauppauge and resulted in three deaths - Arthur Reece, 44, of Selden, who was driving a 1995 Grand Cherokee, his 10-month-old daughter and his 5-year-old stepson, who were passengers. Reece's wife, Kendra Anderson, who was not in the vehicle, said last week she is considering a lawsuit.

Suffolk County police said at the time that Reece's vehicle veered off the eastbound expressway for unknown reasons just east of Exit 56 and struck a tree. Police said the Jeep was engulfed in flames but that it was unknown whether it was struck from behind or whether the fire began before or after the Jeep left the highway.

In the Bridgehampton case, two passengers riding in the 1997 Jeep are suing Chrysler, the dealership that sold the vehicle and the estate of the driver of the other car involved in the accident, a Toyota MR2. The suit is temporarily stalled in State Supreme Court in Riverhead because of Chrysler's bankruptcy filing last year, according to the passengers' attorney, Frank Floriani of Manhattan.

Floriani said one of the two passengers, Natasha Austin, then 25 and living in Manhattan, was severely burned and is scarred. Her sister, Nicole Austin, then 22 and living in Laurel Hollow, also was burned and psychologically traumatized, he said. The driver of the Toyota, Jose Sierra, 27, then of Riverhead, died, apparently of burns. The suit by the Austins seeks $20 million for Natasha and $5 million for Nicole.

The report by Southampton Town police says the Jeep was stopped, waiting to make a left turn, when it was rear-ended by the Toyota. A witness told police, "Almost instantly, I saw a large fireball from the rear of the Jeep."

In the East Moriches crash, a print shop owner from Holbrook, Barry W. Benson, 48, died when his 1997 Grand Cherokee failed to negotiate the curve of an exit ramp and overturned, according to a report by Suffolk County police.

The report does not indicate a fire but the accident is on a list provided to the center by the federal government of crashes that figure into the Jeep investigation. Chrysler said it has no record of a lawsuit against it by any of Benson's survivors.