The more I read about this story, the more it looks like an owner who is upset about getting shafted by his insurance company.
The owners says he traded in his 2011 Camaro SS and a "pristine" 1969 Camaro SS to buy the ZL1. He also goes on to say that he is still making payments on it, so he also pulled a loan to buy it.
The money side just doesn't add up. One would think that a pristine 1969 Camaro SS and a pretty new, and well maintained by the sounds of the owner, 2011 Camaro SS would be enough to cover the entire purchase price of a 2012 ZL1. If not cover it outright, it'd cover a lot of it, making for a very large down payment, plus a small loan for the difference.
So if the ZL1 were totaled, much of the money he had invested in the car would be coming back to him. If it's not, that's between him and his insurance company, not the dealership. That's money he could take and put toward a new 2014 ZL1. In this scenario, I could see the dealership offering to pay the *difference* between what he's getting out of the totaled ZL1 and what a 2014 would cost. That'd be pretty fair.
From the dealer's view, it wasn't a new car. It was two years old, it had mileage on it, and no matter how babied a car it, it depreciates in value rather quickly. Like most small businesses, dealerships don't keep $60,000 just lying around to dole out as charity because one of their former employees was a .
Of course, the other scenario is the guy sold his 1969 and his 2011, took all the money from those and spent it on a boatload of blow, then financed the entire purchase price of the ZL1, leaving him SOL when it was totaled.