Oakland County Jury Returns Record $896.5 Million Verdict for Boy Struck at Continental Test Track

In July 2023, students from a Detroit pre-college engineering program visited a vehicle test track in Oakland County, Michigan for a driving demonstration. The children stood in a tent beside the track. There were no protective barriers between them and the course. During the demonstration, a prototype Mustang test car lost control and careened into the group of onlookers next to the guardrail.

Vincent Gibson's son, one of the boys struck, suffered a fractured skull with bleeding in his brain, a traumatic brain injury, and fractures that required surgical screws. Vincent Gibson sued Continental Automotive Systems Inc. on the boy's behalf in Oakland County Circuit Court, alleging the test driver lacked the qualifications for the maneuver he attempted and that organizers should have known that placing spectators, especially children, that close to the track was unreasonably dangerous.

Continental admitted responsibility before trial, so the July 2026 trial before Judge David Cohen was about damages alone. Jonathan Marko of Marko Law PLLC led the trial team, joined by John Eads of Marko Law and co-counsel Scott Goodwin of Scott Goodwin Law P.C. They presented evidence that the boy lives with permanent brain damage that will follow him for the rest of his life, including testimony that he still needs a parent's help with homework and with getting dressed.

What set the case apart was the defense posture. According to Courtroom View Network, which recorded the trial, Continental made no settlement offer at any point. A mediator had suggested $60 million, a number the plaintiffs were willing to accept. The defense declined. The first dollar figure Continental's lawyers ever floated came in closing argument, when they suggested roughly $10.5 million and argued that the boy's good grades showed little cognitive impairment. Marko attributed the refusal to negotiate to a disconnect between trial counsel and Continental's German insurers, which he said hold $450 million in available coverage.

The jury answered with $896.5 million, returned in the final week of July 2026 after a trial that began July 8. Marko Law reports the exact figure as $896,467,970 and describes it as the largest single-plaintiff verdict in Michigan history.

The number is not final. This is a pre-appeal verdict: post-trial motions are pending, Continental has paid nothing, and Michigan courts can reduce awards of this size on review. CVN's coverage noted that the sheer scale of the verdict could invite trimming on appeal, even though observers described the trial record itself as fairly clean, with few obvious appellate issues. Vincent Gibson also has his own bystander claim against Continental, based on what he witnessed at the track that day, and it is proceeding as a separate case in the same court.