about the whistle-blower who exposed another plant's careless disregard of safe tire production. Still, there were contrary indications that the fault was not all Bridgestone/ Firestone's, that Ford shared the blame General Motors had detected no problems with Firestones it used as standard equipment in 14 of its models, In fact, in July 2001 GM named Firestone as its supplier of the year for the sixth consecutive time Honda of America was also loyal to Firestones, which it used on best-selling Civics and Odysseys. On September 14, 2001, months after all Firestones had been recalled from Ford Explorers, an apparently skilled driver, a deputy bailiff driving home from court, was killed when he lost control of his Explorer and it flipped over a guardrail, slid down an embankment and rolled over several times.