Arizona department of transportation (ADOT) in the US has removed the products from Texas-based guardrail manufacturer Trinity Industries from its approved list for highway construction and maintenance.

The decision comes three days after a Texas jury awarded $175m in fraud claims against the manufacturer.

The US Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) had previously approved the use of products from Trinity Industries and ADOT installed 3,500 units of the company’s ET-Plus Guardrail End Terminals.

"Arizona is closely monitoring the actions of the Federal Highway Administration and other states."

Wall Street Journal reported that the litigation arose from a lawsuit by Josh Harman, who claimed that the company changed the specifications of its endcap, which allegedly failed to perform and resulted in road fatalities.

Harman also alleged that the company made false claims to the authorities when it redesigned its guardrail end system in 2005 and that the redesigned ET-Plus results in the guardrail to jam inside of the end box, turning it into killer spear instead of protecting vehicles.

The company claims that it has not done anything wrong or changed the data, but the federal jury sided with Harman and found the company is liable of defrauding the government under the False Claims Act.

Meanwhile, the FHWA is collecting evidence to see if there are any more cases in which the endcaps failure caused injuries or fatalities.

ADOT said in a statement: "ADOT is responding to the Federal Highway Administration’s request for information on the performance of the ET-Plus system in Arizona.

"ADOT is also examining what was specified for guardrail end treatments versus what Trinity provided. Arizona is closely monitoring the actions of the Federal Highway Administration and other states."