What Volvo Built, What It Hid, and What Got Filed in Federal Court

On April 8, 2025, a federal class action lawsuit landed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against Volvo Car USA, LLC and its Swedish parent, Volvo Car Corporation. The complaint was filed on behalf of lead plaintiff Burhaan Saleh and every American who purchased or leased a recalled Volvo plug-in hybrid from model years 2020 through 2022.

• Civil Action No. 2:25-cv-01806-JS was filed in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania, with a jury trial demanded. The case was prepared by Carpey Law, P.C. of Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania.
• The six affected models are the S90 (2020–2021), S60 (2020–2022), V60 (2020–2022), XC60 (2020–2022), XC90 (2020–2022), and V90 (2022), all plug-in hybrid variants built on Volvo’s SPA (Scalable Product Architecture) platform.
• The recall was triggered by a battery placement decision unique to the SPA platform: instead of mounting the high-voltage battery under the boot floor, Volvo engineers placed it in the center of the vehicle, inside the transmission tunnel. This positioning, combined with a manufacturing or design defect, creates conditions under which battery cells can internally short-circuit.
• An internal short circuit in this context can lead to “thermal runaway,” the point at which the battery generates more heat than it can dissipate, resulting in a fire. The risk is present when the battery is fully charged and the vehicle is parked, meaning the danger does not require driving.
• The aggregated claims of proposed class members exceed $5,000,000, meeting the Class Action Fairness Act threshold for federal jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §1332(d).
• Volvo Car Corporation is identified in the complaint as a wholly owned subsidiary of Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd., the Chinese conglomerate that also owns Geely, Lotus, and a substantial stake in Mercedes-Benz.

Thermal Runaway: The Engineering Failure Volvo Placed In Your Center Console

The phrase “battery defect” undersells what is actually happening inside these vehicles. The complaint describes a physics problem with real-world consequences that Volvo’s own engineers created and then sold to the public.

• In Volvo’s SPA platform architecture, the high-voltage battery is not mounted under the boot floor, as is standard in many hybrid and electric vehicles, but instead sits in the center of the vehicle inside the transmission tunnel. This placement is central to understanding the danger.
• Under certain conditions that the lawsuit does not fully specify (and Volvo has not publicly disclosed), individual battery cells within the module can experience an internal short circuit. This is a failure that occurs inside the sealed battery and cannot be detected from outside the vehicle without diagnostic equipment.
• An internal short circuit generates heat. If that heat generation outpaces the battery’s ability to dissipate it, the system enters “thermal runaway”: a self-reinforcing cycle where rising temperature accelerates the chemical reactions inside the battery, which generates more heat, which accelerates further reactions. The endpoint is fire.
• The risk is documented to be present when the battery is fully charged and the vehicle is parked. This means a Volvo sitting in a garage overnight, plugged in and charging to full, is the scenario most likely to trigger the defect. Owners who charged their cars inside their homes or garages were exposed to this risk without any warning.
• The complaint states there is “no foreseeable reason for any of the individual parts to fail” on their own, placing the cause squarely on Volvo’s improper engineering, design, or manufacturing decisions.
• Volvo’s recall response consists of three steps: a thorough inspection to identify “cell deviations” within the battery module, a software update to enhance battery monitoring, and a module replacement if problems are found. The complaint argues this does not fix the root cause, noting there is “no explanation on the cause of the Defect” offered by Volvo.

Volvo Knew. Volvo Sold Anyway. Volvo Said Nothing.

The complaint’s most serious charge is not about the defect itself. It is about what Volvo allegedly knew, and what Volvo chose to do with that knowledge.

• The lawsuit alleges that Volvo had actual knowledge that the Class Vehicles suffered from an inherent defective battery module before those vehicles were sold. This is a direct allegation of pre-sale knowledge, not a claim that Volvo learned about the problem after the fact.
• Volvo is accused of being in “a superior position to know the true state of facts about the battery module defect,” meaning the company had engineering data, quality control reports, and testing results that consumers had no access to and no way of replicating.
• The defect’s “technical and hidden nature” meant buyers had no practical ability to discover it themselves. Consumers cannot disassemble a battery module at a dealership, and dealerships would not permit it even if they tried.
• Despite this knowledge gap, Volvo continued to market the vehicles as safe and reliable. Salesman representations, promotional materials, and Volvo’s brand reputation were all used to close sales, with none of the known battery risk disclosed.
• The complaint alleges Volvo “intentionally concealed, suppressed, and failed to disclose” the defect across its “uniform advertising and materials provided with each Class Vehicle,” framing this as a company-wide suppression strategy rather than an individual salesperson’s omission.
• The motive the complaint identifies is explicit: Volvo concealed the defect “in order to maintain a market for the Class Vehicles, to protect profits, and to avoid costly recalls that would expose them to liability” and “harm the commercial reputations of Defendants and their products.”
• The complaint characterizes Volvo’s conduct as done “maliciously, oppressively, deliberately, with intent to defraud, and in reckless disregard of Plaintiff’s and the Classes’ rights and well-being to enrich Defendants,” language that opens the door for punitive damages.

What Volvo Actually Took From These Owners

Burhaan Saleh trusted a salesman. He trusted a brand. He trusted decades of Volvo advertising built on the promise of one thing above all else: safety. Volvo has built its entire commercial identity around the idea that it cares more about keeping you alive than any other car company on earth. That promise was the product. That promise is what Saleh bought.

He bought a 2020 XC60. He believed the salesman who told him it was safe and highly reliable. He drove it. He parked it. He plugged it in. He probably thought about where he was going next, not about whether the car in his driveway might catch fire while he slept. That is what it means to trust a machine. You stop thinking about it.

Now he cannot stop thinking about it. The complaint describes a reality where Saleh cannot park his car in his own garage or near his home structures because of the documented fire risk. He was sold a luxury vehicle at a premium price and now has to treat it like a hazard. He parks outside. He worries. Every time the battery charges to full, the same conditions the lawsuit describes as triggering the defect are present. No warning light. No alarm. Just a car sitting there in the dark, charged and waiting.

The insult does not end with the fire risk. The recall itself, Volvo’s supposed remedy, costs Saleh time he did not agree to spend. Hours arranging towing. Hours at a dealership. Money for a tow truck at $4.75 per mile. The complaint estimates this adds up to more than an hour of waiting just for the truck to arrive. And when the repair is done, there is no guarantee. The complaint is explicit: Volvo has offered no explanation of what actually caused the defect, only a module replacement and a software patch. The problem may still be there, wrapped in new hardware.

Then there is the resale question, which is its own quiet cruelty. Saleh paid a premium for a Volvo because Volvo commanded a premium. That premium was built on reputation. Volvo cars hold their value because people believe in the brand. That belief has now been publicly punctured. The car carries a public record of a dangerous defect, visible to any prospective buyer who searches the VIN or reads the news. The complaint puts it plainly: the vehicle’s resale value is now diminished, permanently, regardless of whether the repair is performed. You cannot un-recall a car in the eyes of the market.

This is what Volvo took from Burhaan Saleh and from the other 7,482 American owners in the same position. It took peace of mind. It took time. It took money. It took the confidence that the thing in their driveway is what they were told it was. And the lawsuit alleges Volvo took all of this knowingly, deliberately, because a timely disclosure would have cost the company more than the silence did.

Verbatim From the Complaint: What Volvo’s Own Case File Admits

These are direct quotes from the federal complaint filed April 8, 2025. Every word below is from the lawsuit itself, cited by paragraph number.

“Defendants actively concealed and suppressed these material facts, in whole or in part, in order to maintain a market for the Class Vehicles, to protect profits, and to avoid costly recalls that would expose them to liability for those expenses and harm the commercial reputations of Defendants and their products. They did so at the expense of Plaintiff and Class Members.”

Complaint ¶ 69 — Count II, PUTPCPL Violation

• This paragraph attributes a specific profit-protection motive to Volvo’s concealment, placing it beyond negligence and into deliberate business strategy.
• The phrase “at the expense of Plaintiff and Class Members” frames the concealment as a direct wealth transfer: Volvo kept money it should have spent on disclosure and repair, and consumers paid for that silence in risk, time, and vehicle devaluation.
• This language is foundational to the punitive damages claim, because it establishes that the harm was intentional and calculated, not accidental.

“Plaintiff did not bargain for, or pay for, a vehicle that could catch on fire in park or while driving and which he has to park outside due to the risk of fire to his structures such as his garage or home.”

Complaint ¶ 57 — Count I, Breach of Implied Warranty

• This is the clearest statement of what the defect actually costs an owner in daily life: they cannot safely use their own garage or driveway in the way any reasonable car owner would expect.
• It establishes that the harm is ongoing and behavioral, not just financial. The vehicle’s presence in ordinary domestic spaces carries documented risk.
• Legally, this is the core of the implied warranty breach claim: the car cannot perform the ordinary purpose for which cars are purchased, which is safe transportation and storage.

“The value of a car with a known history of a defective battery and a potential fire hazard is worth much less than a car with properly working battery module, or at least not having a history of defects with risks of the car catching on fire.”

Complaint ¶ 24 — Factual Allegations

• This paragraph documents that the recall itself, independent of any fire occurring, permanently diminishes the vehicle’s market value by creating a public history of the defect.
• Volvo’s own recall, framed as the remedy, is also identified as the mechanism that locks in the financial harm. The company’s solution to the problem simultaneously confirms and publicizes the problem.
• This supports the unjust enrichment count: Volvo collected full purchase price for vehicles it knew would be worth less once the defect became public record.

“Defendants’ acts were done maliciously, oppressively, deliberately, with intent to defraud, and in reckless disregard of Plaintiff’s and the Classes’ rights and well-being to enrich Defendants.”

Complaint ¶ 74 — Count II, PUTPCPL Violation

• This is the punitive damages predicate. For a court to award punitive damages, the conduct must typically rise above negligence to deliberate misconduct. This paragraph argues Volvo’s behavior meets that threshold.
• The phrase “intent to defraud” is not thrown around lightly in federal litigation. Its inclusion signals the plaintiff’s legal team believes there is sufficient evidence to support fraud-level conduct findings.
• The words “to enrich Defendants” complete the legal argument: the fraud was not incidental but was the mechanism by which Volvo generated revenue it should not have collected.

Who Pays When a Corporation Treats Safety as a Cost to Minimize

Public Health and Physical Safety

The defect described in this case is a fire risk in a vehicle that millions of people own, park next to their homes, and store inside garages attached to their living spaces. The documented harms and risks are structural, not hypothetical.

• The fire risk is present when the battery is fully charged and the vehicle is parked, meaning the peak danger occurs in the exact conditions most EV and hybrid owners consider routine and safe: overnight home charging. People who did everything right, who plugged in and went to sleep, were the most exposed.
• The thermal runaway process, once started, is difficult to extinguish. Lithium battery fires require massive volumes of water and can reignite hours after appearing to be out. A car fire triggered by thermal runaway in an attached garage poses a direct structural threat to the home and everyone inside it.
• The complaint identifies both parked and in-motion fire risk, meaning passengers in the vehicle are also at documented risk of harm, not only those in nearby structures. The complaint states the vehicle “could catch on fire in park or while driving.”
• Nearly 73,000 vehicles worldwide carry this defect. In the United States, 7,483 of them were on roads and in driveways, many presumably charged overnight in residential neighborhoods, apartment parking structures, and multi-unit buildings where a single vehicle fire could endanger many people simultaneously.
• Volvo’s recall, the only remedy offered, requires owners to bring their potentially dangerous vehicles to a dealership for repair. For owners without towing coverage or close access to a certified dealership, this means either driving a vehicle they have been warned may be unsafe, or paying significant towing costs to avoid doing so.

Economic Inequality

The financial consequences of this recall fall disproportionately on working people who stretched their budgets to buy a premium vehicle they believed was reliable and safe.

• Volvo plug-in hybrids in the affected model years carry purchase prices in the $45,000–$65,000+ range, representing a significant financial commitment for most buyers. Saleh and other class members paid a premium specifically for Volvo’s safety reputation, a brand promise the lawsuit argues was fraudulent.
• Towing costs at $4.75 per mile are not trivial for owners who live far from certified Volvo dealerships. The complaint estimates over an hour of waiting time for a tow truck alone, before the repair process even begins. This is unpaid time taken from buyers who received a defective product.
• The permanent loss of resale value falls entirely on the owner, not on Volvo. When these owners try to sell their vehicles, the public recall history follows the VIN, suppressing market value. Volvo collected full purchase price; owners sell at a discount. The complaint describes this as placing owners in “a much worse bargaining position” than if the car had been built correctly.
• The class action mechanism itself illustrates the power imbalance: individual owners cannot realistically sue Volvo Car Corporation on their own. The cost and complexity of litigation against a multinational automotive company is prohibitive for a private citizen. Only by aggregating thousands of claims into a class does any path to accountability exist.
• The unjust enrichment count frames the economic harm most starkly: Volvo “obtained unlawfully” full purchase price for vehicles it knew were defective, retaining the financial benefit of that fraud while owners absorbed the costs of repair, towing, time loss, and diminished resale value.

What Volvo Protected by Staying Silent

What You Can Do If You Own One of These Cars, and Who Needs to Answer for This

The lawsuit is in its early stages, filed April 8, 2025. No settlement has been reached and no judgment has been entered. Here is who is accountable and what affected owners and the public can do right now.

Who Is Being Held Accountable

• Volvo Car USA, LLC — Delaware LLC, principal place of business at 1800 Volvo Place, Mahwah, NJ 07430. U.S. distributor, warrantor, and defendant.
• Volvo Car Corporation — Swedish parent company, VAK Building, Assar Gabrielssons vag, Gothenburg, SE-405 31, Sweden. Final design and manufacture authority, co-defendant.
• Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd. — Identified in the complaint as the ultimate parent of Volvo Car Corporation. Not a named defendant but the ultimate corporate beneficiary of the enterprise.

Legal Theories in Play (Five Separate Counts)

• Count I: Breach of Implied Warranty of Merchantability. The car is unfit for its ordinary purpose of safe transportation.
• Count II: Violation of the Pennsylvania Unfair Trade Practice and Consumer Protection Law (73 Pa. Stat. 201). Covers fraudulent omission and deceptive marketing.
• Count III: Unjust Enrichment. Volvo collected purchase prices for vehicles it knew were defective and must return the ill-gotten benefit.
• Count IV: Strict Liability, Design Defect. The battery’s placement and architecture constitute an excessively dangerous design choice.
• Count V: Strict Liability, Manufacturing Defect, plus violation of the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (15 U.S.C. § 2301 et seq.), the federal law that governs written consumer product warranties.

Regulatory Watchlist

• NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration): The primary federal regulator for automotive safety recalls. File a vehicle safety complaint at NHTSA.dot.gov. NHTSA can escalate recall oversight and investigate whether Volvo’s recall remedy is adequate.
• FTC (Federal Trade Commission): Covers deceptive trade practices and false advertising. If Volvo’s safety marketing was materially misleading, it falls within the FTC’s mandate.
• State Attorneys General (California, Pennsylvania): Both states are specifically named in the complaint. State AG offices can pursue consumer protection enforcement independent of the federal lawsuit.
• CFPB (Consumer Financial Protection Bureau): If consumers financed their Volvo purchases through Volvo’s financing arm, there may be grounds for credit-related consumer protection complaints.

Direct Action for Owners and Community

• If you own a recalled model: Do not charge your vehicle to 100% overnight in an enclosed garage until the recall repair is completed. Document every hour and every dollar spent on recall-related transportation. This documentation supports your potential claim as a class member.
• Register as a potential class member: The case is Saleh v. Volvo Car USA, LLC et al., Case 2:25-cv-01806-JS, Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Track it at ClassAction.org or PACER (the federal court document database) to receive updates on class certification and settlement proceedings.
• File a safety complaint with NHTSA: Every documented complaint strengthens regulatory pressure and creates a public record. Go to nhtsa.gov/report-a-safety-problem. Your complaint is public and adds to the evidentiary weight of the recall investigation.
• Join or build mutual aid networks for EV owners: Local EV owner groups can share towing resources, dealership access, and class action updates. If your community has no such group, start one through NextDoor, local Reddit communities, or local environmental justice organizations.
• Pressure Volvo publicly: Volvo’s marketing budget depends on its safety brand. Documented, factual social media posts about this case on platforms where Volvo advertises create accountability pressure that litigation alone cannot generate. Tag @Volvo and cite Case 2:25-cv-01806-JS.
• Do not accept “we fixed it” without documentation: If you take your vehicle in for the recall repair, request written confirmation of what specifically was replaced or updated, and ask the service technician to document that the root cause was identified. If they cannot tell you what caused the defect, you have the right to document that refusal.