Problems with 2002 Toyota Sequoia SEAT BELTS

On august 13, 2011 while traveling on i-75 south of atlanta a vehicle left the road & attempted to return and over corrected, he struck our sequoia with such force in the rear driver side passenger door that the rear of the our sequoia immediately turned sideways and we begin to flip. after flipping we landed on the passenger side and slid approx 1/4 of a mile before coming to resting place in the median on the passengers side. my wife &13 year old son were severely injured, myself and my other 2 sons sustained injuries but none were life threatening. neither my wife's nor my sons seat belt locked and once the windows blew out my son was dragged down the interstate causing severe injuries to his head, back, arm and leg. my wife sustained worse injuries, her arm 6 inches & 6 inches below her elbow was cut off. none of the side curtain airbags deployed and neither seatbelt "fired" properly allowing my wife and son to sustain life altering injuries. no one doubts that if the safety features we paid additional $ for had functioned properly, the outcome could have been much better. soon after the accident i contacted toyota to have the incident investigated. an "independent" investigator read the vehicle edr (blackbox) soon thereafter i received a letter stating that toyota had no responsibility. when i called and spoke to the toyota rep that signed the letter, he was immediately on the defensive. he yelled and tried using intimidation techniques to get me to "go away". my wife is now permanently disabled and unable to work as an rn. i have owned 7 toyota vehicles & paid extra for the side curtain airbags, we as consumers have been deceived by toyota selling us on safety and reliability. i will never own another toyota. i take every opportunity to tell other perspective car purchasers my story & the failure of toyota to take care of their loyal owners. buyer beware. *tr

2002 toyota sequoia power antenna problem. antenna was not operating properly extending up and down, along with a middle row seat belt retraction problem and the plastic car hinge protectors always popping off when one folds up the right middle seat. i went to roseville toyota to fix the problem and was told that they could replace the antenna for approx $200, because the grooves were wearing off, and that i would have to go to the manufacturer to address it because of having to pay $200. having only had this "family" car driven around town for 2 years, i didn't think a toyota should have this problem, thus that's why we keep buying toyota. the manager offered to fix it for $60. i reluctantly agreed and felt that they were trying to accomodate me. three months later, it's not operating properly again. we brought it to roseville toyota again, along with a major scheduled $600 tune-up, and was told that this time, the motor needed to be replaced, costing $325! how can a power antenna have this much problems on an expensive car like the sequoia? we bought it as a family car expecting not to keep shelling out money for a 2 1/2-year-old car. we cannot afford to keep paying little fixes like this for a car which we thought was a quality buy. we expected paying for the scheduled maintenance, but its precisely avoiding this "misc fixes" is the reason we buy toyota. now we have to keep paying for something that should not really keep breaking down because of the implied quality. the sign of a good quality car is the amount of little fixes that need to be done which should be nil. we have had other manufacturers before and know the amount of money that can add up because of these "fixes." i sincerely hope that toyota can address this type of complaint and show that they are a responsible company that addresses their consumer needs. *nm *tr