Honda class-action deal gets tentative OK

A San Diego County Superior Court judge has tentatively approved a class-action settlement between Honda Motor Co. and Civic hybrid owners who said their cars did not get the gas mileage they were promised.

Under the settlement, which was reached in September and is expected to be given final approval Friday, the class-action attorneys will receive $8.5 million.

The Civic owners who joined the lawsuit will get $100 to $200 each, plus rebate coupons toward a future Honda purchase.

“No doubt plaintiffs would have loved to have gotten more,” Judge Timothy Taylor wrote in his tentative ruling. “Certainly their counsel had every incentive to get as much as possible.”

This month, California Atty. Gen. Kamala D. Harris declined to intervene in the settlement.

Harris did not explain her decision, which came after she and five other state attorneys general were considering objecting to it.

The case attracted national attention last month when Heather Peters, a Civic hybrid owner in Los Angeles who declined to join the class-action suit, won a Small Claims Court case in Torrance against Honda on the gas mileage issue.

She was awarded nearly $10,000 in her case, with the court ruling that the carmaker had negligently misled Peters when it contended that her hybrid would get as much as 50 miles per gallon.

Honda filed an appeal in that case.

Even though she isn’t part of the class-action suit, Peters plans to ask for a continuance in the settlement at Friday’s hearing, said the judge overlooked some evidence on safety issues.

“I’m terribly disappointed,” Peters said Thursday of the tentative ruling. “I’ll make my best arguments tomorrow, and we’ll see what we can do about it.”

Chris Martin, a spokesman for Honda, said the company would not comment until after Friday’s hearing.