LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Allegations of odometer fraud by a trusted American brand.
It's a story 13 investigates first broke two years ago. Now, there's a major development in a case that began with a local man that has national implications.
FedEx forever changed expectations of delivery wait times. The shipping giant's website boasts a fleet of over 200,000 vehicles worldwide. Their trucks rack up lots of miles to make those speedy deliveries.
When FedEx retires trucks, they're often resold through auto auctions and converted to other uses like food trucks. However, a newly-filed federal class action lawsuit says some of those trucks harbor a dangerous secret.
The lawsuit accuses FedEx of participating in the largest odometer fraud scheme in U.S. automotive history.
13 investigates first met Tom Layton in the spring of 2021 when he shared his story exclusively with 13 Investigates.
"What brought us here today is I'm a commercial truck dealer," he said.
Based in Henderson, Layton has been buying and selling trucks for 36 years.
"Over the last several years, I've noticed that some of the commercial trucks that have been going through my dealership had issues with the odometers," he said.
He made the discovery in March 2017 when he sold a Freightliner delivery truck to a FedEx contractor in Washington state.
"About a month after the sale, the FedEx contractor contacted me and said, 'hey! What are you trying to pull here? And I said, 'what's wrong?' And he said, 'I took this into Freightliner and had the vehicle hooked up to the computer. And it has over 400,000 miles. And your odometer says 180,000 miles'."
Tom was determined to find out how and why the odometer readings didn't match up.
"...and through our research, found out that the odometer was changed by FedEx, not by any car dealership," Layton said.
He says he figured that out by comparing odometers. That discovery led to a federal class action lawsuit filed last week in New Jersey.
The four named plaintiffs represent thousands of potential victims from across the country.
Many of them in different lines of work including food truck owners and other mom and pop businesses. These operators who shelled out much of their life savings to buy and refit former FedEx trucks that they believed had low mileage, often less than 100,000 miles.
However, the lawsuit says they started having serious mechanical breakdowns, the kind seen in vehicles that are past their expected life cycle of about 300,000 miles.
One food truck owner was forced to go out of business when he learned his vehicle would soon need a new engine.
Court documents say FedEx engaged in large-scale replacement of odometers on thousands of vehicles with no valid reason.
FedEx is accused of failing to reset the odometers to the actual mileage, and failing to disclose that the odometers were replaced which is required by federal law.
The lawsuit alleges that FedEx, and its fleet management company, Holman Fleet Leasing, were then able to resell the vehicles on the used market for much more money than their actual worth.
FedEx declined our request for an on-camera interview. They sent a statement to say "they had not yet been served with the complaint or had the opportunity to fully review the lawsuit's allegations."
Holman Fleet Leasing said while it's their policy not to comment on pending litigation, the company complies with its legal obligations and looks forward to defending the case in court.
Tom Layton, whose story we first shared in 2021, is still fighting his own federal lawsuit that he filed nearly six years ago. He said he couldn't comment on the class action case because he's not named in that litigation.
