Tesla knew about autopilot steering malfunction before fatal crash, lawyer reveals 

An attorney suing Tesla over a fatal accident has told a California state court that that the electric vehicle giant had prior knowledge of a steering malfunction in its Autopilot driver assistant feature.  

According to a Reuters report, the internal safety analysis conducted by the company indicated that this issue had been identified about two years earlier. 

The litigants in this case are seeking a significant combined jury award of $400 million, excluding punitive damages. 

The civil lawsuit revolves around a tragic incident involving Micah Lee's Model 3 in 2019. The lawsuit contends that Tesla's Autopilot system caused Lee's vehicle to suddenly veer off a highway near Los Angeles, hurtling towards a palm tree at a speed of 65 miles per hour. The collision led to a fiery explosion, claiming Lee's life and seriously injuring his two passengers, including a young boy who was disembowelled in the crash. The central claim in the lawsuit is that Autopilot was defective, putting Tesla's safety systems under intense scrutiny. 

Jonathan Michaels, the attorney representing the passengers, presented a 2017 internal Tesla safety analysis during the proceedings. This analysis pointed to an "incorrect steering command" as a defect in the Autopilot system, highlighting an "excessive" steering wheel angle. Reuters quoted Michaels in a statement to the jury, asserting, "They predicted this was going to happen. They knew about it. They named it." He also revealed that Tesla had developed a protocol to address this issue, instructing employees to accept no liability or responsibility for the problem. 

In response to these allegations, Tesla's attorney, Michael Carey, presented a different perspective. Carey argued that the safety analysis did not explicitly identify a defect. Instead, it was intended to help the company address any potential issues with the vehicle. Subsequently, Tesla engineered a system to prevent Autopilot from executing the turn that led to the fatal crash. He emphasised that this safety system acted as a "brick wall" against the plaintiffs' claims, noting that no other Tesla vehicle had exhibited the same behaviour in similar circumstances. 

The legal battle between the plaintiffs and Tesla has further intensified with allegations that Tesla released Autopilot in an experimental stage due to a pressing need to increase market share. Michaels argued that Tesla showed little regard for the potential loss of life in this pursuit. However, Carey countered this claim, insisting that the simplest explanation for the crash was human error. According to Reuters, he urged the jury not to award damages solely based on empathy for the victims' severe injuries, stating, "Empathy is a real thing, we're not saying it's not. But it does not make cars defective." 

(With inputs from Reuters) 

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