Tesla was able to fend off its first autopilot lawsuit
2. November 2023Tesla was able to fend off its first autopilot lawsuit
San Francisco, November 2, 2023
A California jury ruled Tuesday that Tesla was not at fault in a fatal accident in 2019 that reportedly involved its Autopilot system. The lawsuit alleged that Tesla knowingly shipped cars with a faulty Autopilot system, resulting in a fatal accident that killed a Model 3 owner and seriously injured two passengers.
According to the lawsuit, 37-year-old Micah Lee was driving his Tesla Model 3 at 65 miles per hour on a Los Angeles highway when it suddenly made a turn, crashed into a palm tree and caught fire, resulting in his death.
Lee’s estate and two surviving relatives filed a $400 million lawsuit against Tesla, alleging that the company sold Lee faulty „experimental“ software in its 2019 Model 3, which was supposedly capable of fully autonomous driving.
Tesla attributed the crash to human error and argued there was no clear evidence that Autopilot was active during the accident.
The jury made a 9-3 decision in favor of Tesla and found that there was no software error.
It is Tesla’s first autopilot lawsuit resulting in death. The result is expected to set a precedent for future trials of the company’s semi-autonomous driving technology.
