A California state court jury on Friday awarded Tesla a landslide win, finding that the automaker’s autopilot function didn’t operate safely in what appears to be the primary attempt at a crash involving partially automated driving software.
The decision could possibly be a significant victory for Tesla because it tests and deploys its Autopilot and more advanced “fully autonomous driving” system that CEO Elon Musk has touted as crucial to his company’s future but which has come under regulatory and legal scrutiny.
Justine Hsu, a Los Angeles resident, sued the electrical vehicle manufacturer in 2020, claiming her Tesla Model S veered a curb while on autopilot after which deployed the airbag “so violently that it broke the plaintiff’s jaw, knocked out his teeth, and caused nerve damage to her face.”
It claimed that there have been defects in the autopilot and airbag design, and sought greater than $3 million in damages for the alleged defects and other claims.
Tesla denied responsibility for the 2019 accident. The lawsuit alleges that Hsu used autopilot on city streets, despite warning Tesla’s manual not to achieve this.
At a Los Angeles Superior Court hearing on Friday, a jury awarded Hsu zero damages.
It was also revealed that the airbag did not fail to operate safely and that Tesla did not intentionally withhold the facts from it.
Hsu burst into tears outside the courtroom after the jury announced their verdict.
Certainly one of Hsu’s attorneys, Donald Slavik, said he was dissatisfied with the end result and appreciated the jury’s work. Tesla’s attorney, Michael Carey, declined to comment.
Tesla calls its driver assistance systems Autopilot or Full Self-Driving, but says these features don’t make cars autonomous, and drivers must be “prepared to take control at any time.”
The electrical vehicle manufacturer introduced autopilot in 2015, and the primary fatal accident in the USA was reported in 2016, however the case never went to court.
Critical time for Tesla
Hsu’s trial, which was not reported by other media, took place in the Los Angeles Superior Court over the past three weeks and included the testimony of three Tesla engineers.
This comes at a critical time for the corporate because it prepares for a series of other trials starting this yr related to a semi-automated driving system that Musk says is safer than drivers.
While the end result of the trial is not legally binding in other cases, it is taken into account a test case because it will function a tenet to assist Tesla and other plaintiffs’ lawyers refine their strategies, experts say.
Cassandra Burke Robertson, a professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Law who has studied the liability of self-driving cars, said the early cases “suggest what later cases might seem like.”
Tesla can be under investigation by the Department of Justice and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration over its claims regarding the self-driving capability and safety of the technology, respectively.
The predominant query in the autopilot cases was who’s accountable for an accident when the automobile was in driver assistance autopilot mode – the motive force, the machine or each?
Hsu’s lawsuit alleged that Tesla’s vehicle hit the curb so suddenly that she did not have time to avoid it, despite keeping her hands on the wheel and being alert.
Reuters was the primary to report that a 2016 video utilized by Tesla to advertise its self-driving technology was actually staged to point out capabilities – similar to stopping on a red light and accelerating on a green – that the system did not have, in accordance with the testimony of a senior engineer.
The main points of the video come from a Tesla executive’s testimony in one other case.
This executive, Ashok Elluswamy, director of Autopilot software at Tesla, testified at Hsu’s trial last week concerning the videotape.