Ford Super Duty F-250 Wrongful Death Lawsuit Filed Over Defective Roof

Car maker has allegedly faced hundreds of lawsuits over injuries and deaths caused when its Super Duty trucks’ roofs collapsed during rollover accidents.

According to a wrongful death lawsuit filed earlier this week, Ford has known for years that some of its pickup trucks are subject to a “roof-crush defect,” yet has failed to warn owners or fix the problem.

The complaint (PDF) was brought by Wendy Widhalm-Schlosser in the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana on December 16, naming Ford Motor Company as the sole defendant. It links the death of Widhalm-Schlosser’s husband, Dennis Schlosser, to a “roof-crush defect” design problem with his 2003 Ford F-250 Super Duty truck.

Schlosser’s widow argues that roof-crush defects occur as a result of problems with the roof structures in some Ford vehicles, which can lead to catastrophic collapses during rollover accidents that may seriously injure or kill occupants who otherwise may have survived. Widhalm-Schlosser indicates this is precisely what happened to her husband when his truck rolled over in a July 2025 accident.

According to Widhalm-Schlosser’s Ford Super Duty F-250 wrongful death lawsuit, her husband was pulling a trailer while driving down a rural Nevada highway on July 3, 2025, when a gust of wind rolled the truck, causing the accident. It was the beginning of his retirement, and he was bringing furniture and personal belongings from California to his home in Ennis, Montana.

She claims that had the Ford F-250’s roof been properly designed, this would not have been a deadly crash. However, the driver’s side roof collapsed during the accident, crushing Schlosser and causing fatal injuries that led to his death on July 11.

The complaint argues that Ford knew the roof’s design, used in 1999-2016 model year Super Duty trucks, had a history of failing during rollover accidents, resulting in serious injuries, paralysis or death of occupants. However, the auto maker failed to correct the dangerous and defective condition.

“Documentation of Ford’s internal testing and safety evaluations show that prior to the development of the 1999–2016 Super Duty trucks, Ford knew that rollovers were far more dangerous to vehicle occupants than other types of crashes. These documents also show that Ford knew strong vehicle roofs were fundamental to minimizing serious injury in a rollover.”

– Wendy Widhalm-Schlosser v. Ford Motor Company

Ford designed the Super Duty trucks with roof tolerances meant for its lighter vehicles, like the F-150 and Ranger designs, the lawsuit indicates. The complaint claims the company then downgraded materials and made passenger protection weaker in the final design to save additional money and sent them to market with no real-world rollover accident testing.

The lawsuit states that Ford knew there was a problem as early as 1999 when it began receiving reports of Super Duty roofs collapsing, killing and disabling drivers. It notes that, as of February 2025, Ford was aware of 285 lawsuits linked to deaths and injuries related to Super Duty roof collapses.

In August 2022, a Georgia jury returned a $1.7 billion verdict against Ford over the role of one of its vehicle’s roofs in the 2014 deaths of Melvin and Voncile Hill. Afterward, the manufacturer settled many of these lawsuits quietly, including confidentiality provisions, according to the complaint. This allows Ford to continue to sell the trucks with defective roof designs, Widhalm-Schlosser alleges.

She presents claims of strict product liability, defective design, failure to warn, negligence and loss of consortium. The lawsuit seeks both compensatory and punitive damages.

Sign up for more legal news that could affect you or your family.