Last week for my birthday I was gifted a 2013 Scion tC, and there was almost immediately a problem. 3 time's randomly throughout the week, while driving on smooth pavement my Traction Control light came on, and if I pressed on the brake the car would stutter or fail completely, and a loud groaning shuddering noise would occur. Each time I pulled over, turned the car off for a while, turn it back on and I would keep driving because it was fine again, and my parents and I had thought the sensor was just sensitive. Keep in mind it was ONLY the Traction Control light, nothing else. No ABS or Check Engine light. I've also tried turning off Traction Control and it did nothing. The first time this happened I had called my dad and turned off the car, him and I switched cars, and he test drove it like a mad man on back roads for over 10 miles and he said nothing happened and every thing seemed totally fine with it.

Yesterday while on the freeway going home, with 3 other people from my family in the car with me, the Traction Control light once again came on and began blinking at me if I stopped accelerating, but I could assume what would happen if I braked so I decided to finish the 2 miles left till my exit. As soon as I came off the freeway, and I was braking to slow down to make a left turn off the exit, my car jerked to a stuttered stop in the middle of the intersection. I released the brake and it started cruising so I accelerated to get out of said intersection. Probably barely accelerating 20ft, without pressing the brake, my car jerked and stuttered to an almost complete stop again, and the loud groaning noise was back. I turned on my hazards and did my best to pull to the side of the road as cars drove around mine, and tried letting my car cruise down the overpass we were on, as my home was around the block. Without pressing the brake along with the accelerator my car kept doing it, some times worse than others as the noise was louder and it jerked harder. I ended up making it home with lightly pressing the accelerator while it kept happening. Parking on the street we went inside my dad's home and informed him on what happened, he code checked it and nothing came up. My uncle is a retired automotive mechanic and he claims he's fixed up several tC's, however even he is unsure of what might be happening so he plans to come and check it out himself. At the moment he believe's it might be a broken speed sensor, but it doesn't make sense that this problem has only occurred while driving on smooth clear pavement.

If someone could help me figure out what on earth is going on with my car that would be great, I'll answer any questions 🥲