A Florida court on Friday (US time) convicted Tesla of a fatal 2019 crash involving a Model S equipped with autopilot, and ordered the company of billionaire Elon Musk to pay the family of the deceased woman and the surviving injured passenger $243 million in damages, Reuters and the Associated Press reported, quoted by BTA.
A jury in federal court in Miami awarded Naybel Benavides Leon and her former partner Dylan Angulo $129 million in compensatory damages, of which Tesla must cover 33 percent, plus $200 million punitive damages, the ruling cited by Reuters reads.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs said it was the first lawsuit involving a third-party death caused by Autopilot. The plaintiffs had sought $345 million.
„Tesla“ has faced many similar lawsuits over the self-driving capabilities of its cars, but so far they have been resolved without going to trial. Earlier this summer, a judge rejected the company's efforts to dismiss the case, and experts said that this could encourage others who are suing the electric car maker, Reuters notes.
Alex Lehman, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Law School, said that „this is the first time „Tesla“ has been hit with a verdict in one of the many fatal cases resulting from its self-driving car technology“.
The verdict could hamper efforts by Elon Musk, the world's richest man, to convince investors that “Tesla“ can become a leader in so-called “autonomous driving“ for private cars, as well as in the robotaxis it plans to start producing next year. The company's shares fell 1.8 percent on Friday, Reuters noted.
“Tesla“ plans to appeal the verdict, the agencies reported.
The lawsuit concerns an incident on April 25, 2019, in which the owner of a 2019 Model S flew through an intersection at a speed of about 100 km/h and crashed into the victims' stopped “Chevrolet Tahoe“. The man with the car "The Tesla" reached for a cellphone it had dropped on the floor and allegedly received no signals, despite having passed a stop sign and traffic light before hitting the victims' SUV.
"Tesla" designed its Autopilot system only for controlled-access highways, but deliberately chose not to restrict drivers from using it elsewhere, and Elon Musk is telling the world that Autopilot drives better than humans," plaintiffs' attorney Brett Schreiber said in a statement.