Judge finds evidence that Tesla, Elon Musk knew about Autopilot defect
Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and other managers knew the automaker's vehicles had a defective Autopilot system but still allowed the cars to be driven unsafely, according to a ruling.
Judge Reid Scott, in the Circuit Court for Palm Beach County, ruled last week that the plaintiff in a lawsuit over a fatal crash could proceed to trial and bring punitive damages claims against Tesla for intentional misconduct and gross negligence. The order has not been previously reported.
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Offering CollegeCourseWebsiteIndian School of BusinessISB Product ManagementVisitIIT DelhiIITD Certificate Programme in Data Science & Machine LearningVisitIIM KozhikodeIIMK Senior Management ProgrammeVisit The ruling is a setback for Tesla after the company won two product liability trials in California earlier this year over the Autopilot driver assistant system. A Tesla spokesperson could not immediately be reached for comment on Tuesday.
The Florida lawsuit arose out of a 2019 crash north of Miami in which owner Stephen Banner's Model 3 drove under the trailer of an 18-wheeler big rig truck that had turned onto the road, shearing off the Tesla's roof and killing Banner. A trial set for October was delayed, and has not been rescheduled.
Bryant Walker Smith, a University of South Carolina law professor, called the judge's summary of the evidence significant because it suggests «alarming inconsistencies» between what Tesla knew internally, and what it was saying in its marketing.
«This opinion opens the door for a public trial in which the judge seems inclined to admit a lot of testimony and other evidence that could be pretty awkward for Tesla and its CEO,» Smith said. «And now the result
