Open Letter to all Florida Law Enforcement Officers Ticket all vehicles with open safety recalls:

Dear Florida law enforcement officer,

If you’re with the Florida Highway Patrol, County Sheriff’s Department, or local city police, you’re empowered by Florida law to issue citations and warnings to unsafe vehicles on Florida’s roads. You typically exercise this duty by citing drivers of vehicles with faulty tail, brake, and head lights, unsafe tires, or even a noncompliant license plate frame.

My suggestion to you is to prioritize citing drivers of vehicles with dangerous safety recalls, especially Takata airbags. There are more deaths and injuries from defective Takata airbags in Florida than all the other 49 states. This is because of Florida’s above average heat and humidity which causes the airbag inflator to EXLODE, sending shrapnel throughout the inside of the vehicle, killing and maiming passengers. Furthermore, SEVENTY-FIVE PERCENT of the cars on the roads with safety recalls have never been repaired. Most of these dangerous cars are older and are being driven by a 2nd, 3rd, 4th or later owners. The manufacturers of these cars are unable to contact most of these endangered drivers because of old, inaccurate addresses. There’s also the apathy of many drivers to take the time to bring their car in for repair. Lastly, thousands of vehicles on the road, especially those with defective Takata airbags, have NO FIX AVAILABLE. The huge Takata airbag recall demand has exceeded the manufacturers’ capacity to build the airbag inflators. Some vehicle owners are waiting over a year for a replacement airbag.

Your squad cars are equipped with sophisticated computers which can cross-reference the license plate number of any vehicle on the roads and display the VIN, vehicle identification number, aka serial number. You have direct access to the National Highway Traffic Association’s (NHTSA) database (www.SaferCar.gov) This source, with the VIN, tells you if the car you’re driving behind has an unfixed Takata air bag or any other dangerous safety recall. The NHTSA data base will also tell you IF there is a fix available for this recall.

I suggest that you first issue a warning to all drivers of vehicles with unfixed safety recalls, giving them 7 days to have the vehicle repaired; if they fail to comply, issue a suspension of their driver’s license. If the NHTSA database tells you that the safety recall has no fix available, you should require the driver to drive immediately to the nearest dealership of his vehicle’s make and rent a car or receive a free loaner.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter. I’m going directly to you, our Florida law enforcement officers, because our governor, legislators, and regulators have all let us down. Clearly, it should be illegal to sell a car with a dangerous safety recall, but our governor and lawmakers will not act. At the very least, it should be required that the buyer of a car with a dangerous safety recall be advised prior to sale, this has not been done either. Therefore, thousands of used cars with dangerous safety recalls are being sold to unsuspecting Floridians daily.

I believe you have the authority and the responsibility to take dangerous vehicles off the road and you can exercise this authority under our existing laws without waiting any longer for the politicians and regulators to act. Furthermore, I believe your action will put the pressure on the politicians, regulators, auto manufacturers and car dealers to do the right thing. The legislators and regulators have “sat on their hands” because of the huge lobbying efforts by auto manufacturers, car dealers, and their associations.Once the drivers of Florida, most of whom are also VOTERS, begin to be pulled over by law enforcement and warned or have their license suspended, you will see our politicians and regulators suddenly begin to do the right thing.



Thanks very much for considering my suggestion,



Earl Stewart

Cell Phone 561 358-1474