TORRANCE, Calif. -

Toyota emphatically responded to multiple reports late last week that stemmed from revised lawsuit claims alleging the automaker secretly bought back vehicles associated with alleged unintended acceleration.

The latest turn of events surfaced when lawsuit claims filed in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana, Calif., charged that the automaker allegedly received confidentiality agreements barring former Toyota owners from discussing the matter in exchange for taking back a defective unit, reports indicate.

The automaker began its most recent comments by saying, “Recent news reports have stated that Toyota dealership technicians were able to duplicate customer claims of unintended acceleration; that Toyota repurchased the vehicles in question; and that Toyota failed to properly inform the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the situation.

“Toyota quickly and thoroughly investigates any customer reports of unintended acceleration in its vehicles through its rapid-response SMART evaluation process,” the company continued. “Field technical specialists and engineers were deployed in response to reports of two acceleration events that dealer technicians reportedly observed.  

“At these dealerships, Toyota FTS and engineers were unable to duplicate the condition and the vehicles were repurchased from the customers for further engineering analysis,” the OEM emphasized.

Executives reiterated protocol they created after several rounds of recalls earlier this year.

“After having thoroughly analyzed these vehicles and driven them for thousands of miles, Toyota FTS and engineers have not been able to replicate the customers’ acceleration concerns nor found any related issues or conditions in these vehicles,” they explained.

“In fact, test driving of these vehicles is ongoing and they are operating safely,” Toyota added.

The automaker also emphasized that it confirmed that NHTSA was informed three separate times of the two vehicles in question in the latest lawsuit claims.

Toyota said the first instance was in connection with in timely compliance with the TREAD Act (for the Corolla in May and for the Tacoma in December of last year). The company indicated the second occurrence came in the spring of this year — a response to NHTSA’s document request in connection with its recall query.

Also, the automaker stated it made a voluntary response to an informal NHTSA request on Oct. 20.

“Toyota looks forward to defending against the allegations made in the plaintiffs’ amended consolidated complaint that was recently filed in the ongoing multidistrict litigation class action,” the automaker said.