Bill Simpson, an ally of NASCAR since the early 1980s, is now officially at war with Bill France Jr. and his organization.

Attorneys James H. Voyles and Robert W. Horn filed a 14-page, $8.5 million dollar lawsuit on Simpson's behalf Wednesday morning in Marion County Superior Court four days before NASCAR's biggest event, the Daytona 500.

	Bill Simpson wants his name absolved in the death of his friend Dale Earnhardt.

"For 44 years, Bill Simpson has been a vanguard of safety in auto racing and for the past 12 months he's been defamed by NASCAR," Horn said. "He'll never be the same because he lost a close friend, but he wants his reputation restored.

"I think it takes a huge amount of courage on his part but he knows the truth and it needs to be brought out."

The suit charges NASCAR cost Simpson a loss of reputation, commercial advantage and sales, plus mental anguish and emotional distress resulting from accusations made following Dale Earnhardt's death last year.

"People made allegations that Bill had something to do with the death of his longtime friend and he's been suffering with that ever since," Voyles said, referring to the death threats that caused Simpson to move out of his house in Charlotte and come to Indianapolis.

NASCAR issued a statement on Wednesday responding to allegations made in the lawsuit.

"The Bill Simpson lawsuit is totally without merit. We will vigorously defend ourselves against his false allegations," the statement read. "NASCAR will continue to focus its efforts on safety, working with members of the NASCAR industry, including Simpson Performance Products, Inc."

No hearing has been set.

NASCAR has 23 days to respond, once it is served notice of the suit, Horn said.

"Our corporate policy is we never comment on pending or active litigation," NASCAR spokesman Jim Hunter said Wednesday from Daytona before the league released its statement.

Originally, the suit was to have been filed Tuesday morning, but Voyles and Horn were contacted by NASCAR's legal counsel in an effort to try and work out an agreement to avoid litigation. Simpson's attorneys requested a two-paragraph apology but, apparently, that couldn't be agreed on.

"The only word NASCAR agreed on in two paragraphs was 'The' so we're going to court," said Simpson, who remains a minority shareholder in Simpson Safety Products but no longer owns the company. "Apology isn't in their vocabulary."

Simpson Performance Products had been named as a plaintiff on the original draft of the lawsuit but a spokesman for SPP said the company never intended to fight NASCAR.

"The other plaintiffs never asked Simpson Performance Products if it wanted to participate and we didn't even know there was a lawsuit until we read the story on ESPN's web site," spokeswoman Gail Rosenberg said.

"Our company never asked to be part of the lawsuit so we asked that our name be removed from it."

Four days after Earnhardt was killed on the final lap of the Daytona 500, NASCAR announced that a seatbelt made by Simpson Safety Products had separated and contributed to the fatal injuries incurred by the seven-time Winston Cup champion.

Simpson, a pioneer in motorsports safety since the late '50s, countered that his belts had never failed when properly installed and that he'd warned Earnhardt several times about the potential consequences.

Team owner Richard Childress has refuted Simpson's statements about having warned Earnhardt that his belts had not been installed safely.

NASCAR paid for an investigation into the accident and concluded last August that not only was a separated belt a factor in Earnhardt's death but that he died of blunt force trauma to the head after his helmet slid forward and exposed the back of his head.

"We expected Bill to be exonerated last summer by NASCAR, but that didn't happen," Voyles said. Mark Martin, who still uses Simpson products in both his car and his 10-year-old son's car, said he understood why Simpson filed the suit.

"It's been very hard on his business and I don't think that's fair at all," Martin said. "Everyone lost on that, but it was hard on Bill both personally and professionally.

"I never got the impression that NASCAR blamed the seat belt, but Bill felt differently. I just feel real, real bad for Bill because he's done so much for safety in our sport."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.