Mercedes Dealer Ordered to Pay $20,270 After Technician’s Wild Night Out

A Tennessee judge has ruled in favor of a customer, Kimberly Porter, who tracked her Mercedes-Benz C300 to two local bars while it was supposed to be at the Mercedes-Benz of Collierville dealership for repairs. The judge rejected the dealer’s claim that the technician, Derrick Nguyen, had permission to take the vehicle on an extended test drive, calling the late-night bar run ‘extreme and outrageous conduct’. Porter had left her car at the dealership after it suffered problems she believed were caused by contaminated fuel. However, on the evening of January 16, she received GPS notifications showing the car leaving the dealership and visiting two bars, J. Alexander’s and TJ Mulligan’s. Porter found her car in the parking lot of the second bar and called the police, who arrested Nguyen on a theft charge. The court awarded Porter a total of $20,270, including $15,000 in punitive damages. The judge stated that customers reasonably expect their vehicles to remain ‘kept in local proximity to the dealership or shop’ while being serviced and do not expect them to be used for ‘some personal purpose’. Nguyen is still facing a criminal theft charge and is scheduled to return to court next month. The dealership and Nguyen have not indicated whether they intend to appeal the civil judgment.