A California state court jury on Friday handed Tesla a sweeping win, finding that the automobile maker’s Autopilot feature didn’t fail to perform safely in what appears to be the primary trial related to a crash involving the partially automated driving software.
The decision may very well be a vital victory for Tesla because it tests and rolls out its Autopilot and more advanced “Full Self-Driving” system, which Chief Executive Elon Musk has touted as crucial to his company’s future, but which has drawn regulatory and legal scrutiny.
Justine Hsu, a resident of Los Angeles, sued the electric-vehicle maker in 2020, saying her Tesla Model S swerved right into a curb while it was on Autopilot after which an airbag was deployed “so violently it fractured Plaintiff’s jaw, knocked out teeth, and caused nerve damage to her face.”
She alleged there have been defects within the design of Autopilot and the airbag, and sought greater than $3 million in damages for the alleged defects and other claims.
Tesla denied liability for the 2019 accident. It said in a court filing that Hsu used Autopilot on city streets, despite Tesla’s user manual warning against doing so.
During a court hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court on Friday, the jury awarded Hsu zero damages.
It also found that the airbag didn’t fail to perform safely, and that Tesla didn’t intentionally fail to reveal facts to her.
Hsu broke down in tears outside the courtroom after the jury delivered its verdict.
One in every of Hsu’s attorneys, Donald Slavik, said they’re dissatisfied within the result and appreciate the jury’s service. Tesla attorney Michael Carey declined to comment.
Tesla calls its driver-assistant systems Autopilot or Full Self-Driving, but says the features don’t make the cars autonomous, and that human drivers ought to be “prepared to take over at any moment.”
The EV maker introduced its Autopilot in 2015, and the primary fatal accident in america was reported in 2016, however the case never went to trial.
Critical time for Tesla
The Hsu trial, which has not been reported by other media, unfolded in Los Angeles Superior Court during the last three weeks, and featured testimony from three Tesla engineers.
It got here at a critical time for the corporate because it braces for a spate of other trials starting this 12 months related to the semi-automated driving system, which Musk has claimed is safer than human drivers.
While the trial’s end result will not be legally binding in other cases, it is taken into account a test case because it will function a bellwether to assist Tesla and other plaintiffs’ lawyers hone their strategies, experts say.
Cassandra Burke Robertson, a professor on the Case Western Reserve University School of Law who has studied self-driving automobile liability, said early cases “give a sign of how later cases are more likely to go.”
Tesla can be under investigation by the Justice Department and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration over its claims about self-driving capabilities and the protection of the technology, respectively.
The primary query in Autopilot cases was who’s chargeable for an accident while a automobile was in driver-assistant Autopilot mode — a human driver, the machine, or each?
Hsu’s lawsuit alleged that the Tesla vehicle hit the curb so suddenly that she had no time to avoid it despite the fact that she had her hands on the steering wheel and was alert.
Reuters was first to report that a 2016 video utilized by Tesla to advertise its self-driving technology was actually staged, to indicate capabilities — comparable to stopping at a red light and accelerating at a green light — that the system didn’t have, in accordance with testimony by a senior engineer.
The main points concerning the video were from a deposition of a Tesla executive in one other case.
That executive, Ashok Elluswamy, director of Autopilot software at Tesla, testified in the course of the Hsu trial last week concerning the videotape.
