More Hertz customers have come forward and revealed that the rental car giant accused them of stealing vehicles that they had simply rented.
A total of 191 claims have been filed in bankruptcy court on behalf of individuals who were falsely arrested after reports made by Hertz. Among the claimants is Carrie Gibbs, who was placed into custody in 2019 at a California gas station while driving a rented truck from Hertz.
Speaking with CBS News, Gibbs revealed that the truck had been rented for her by an insurance company after she was involved in an accident. She was arrested, charged with felony car theft, and went to jail. While the case was later dismissed, she lost her real estate license for a year.
A NASA employee had a similar experience. Court papers reveal that he was driving a rented SUV from Hertz when he was arrested and held at gun point after the rental company filed a theft report about the vehicle, claiming that it was stolen.
In one particularly serious case, Carmen Bosko rented a car from a Hertz location in January and returned it in April. Fast forward to August and she was arrested for car theft and ultimately spent 40 days in jail. In another case, Steven Robinsold was arrested in June for car theft despite never even renting a car from Hertz. He is now being prosecuted on felony charges.
“I mean, this was the worst experience ever in my life,” Robinsold explained. “And I can’t believe that Hertz and it was a good slogan I heard, but Hertz really hurts people. Their negligent practices is like, it’s terrible.”
Attorney Francis Alexander Malofiy is leading the class-action lawsuit and says more people are coming forward. He and his clients are asking for around $530 million in damages based on days spent in prison, days of prosecution, reputation damage, expungement, and credit repair.
“Hertz can’t find their cars. They can’t fix their broken computer systems,” Malofiy explained to News 4 Nashville. “They cannot address their standard operating procedures they should follow and they’re breaking other ones. And it’s leading to a horrible result where droves of people are coming forward because they’re being falsely arrested, jailed or prosecuted by Hertz. And it needs to stop.”
Hertz is refusing to comment on individual cases and has re-issued a statement it first made in early November.
“Hertz cares deeply about our customers, and we successfully provide rental vehicles for tens of millions of travelers each year. Unfortunately, in the legal matters being discussed, the attorneys have a track record of making baseless claims that blatantly misrepresent the facts. The vast majority of these cases involve renters who were many weeks or even months overdue returning vehicles and who stopped communicating with us well beyond the scheduled due date. Situations where vehicles are reported to the authorities are very rare and happen only after exhaustive attempts to reach the customer.”