A Palm Beach County circuit judge has denied Tesla’s motion to dismiss a wrongful death case brought by the widow of a Lake Worth Beach man who died in a collision while driving a Tesla Model 3 equipped with an Autopilot system.
Judge Reid Scott issued the opinion on Nov. 17, paving the way for a possible trial to allow plaintiff Kim Banner to recover damages from Tesla and the owner and driver of a semi-tractor trailer after the death of her husband, Jeremy Banner. Banner died when his 2018 Tesla vehicle collided with the commercial truck, even though the Autopilot system was engaged at the time of the crash, according to the original complaint filed by Banner in 2019.
“... The subject Tesla Model 3 struck the left side of the semi-tractor trailer, causing the roof of the Tesla to be sheared off as the vehicle under-road the semi-tractor trailer and continued southbound coming to final rest 1,600 feet from where the collision occurred …” the complaint said.
The lawsuit alleged that, according to Tesla, the Autopilot’s capabilities “would prevent the vehicle from colliding with other obstacles/objects.”
Scott’s Nov. 17 opinion is not available on the Palm Beach County clerk’s website because it is subject to a confidentiality order. The Associated Press (AP), however, obtained a copy of the order after it was mistakenly posted on the clerk’s website.
Scott concluded that the plaintiff’s lawyers had provided enough evidence to justify a trial in 2024. Banner can also seek punitive damages from Tesla, potentially reaching in the millions of dollars, according to AP.
“It would be reasonable to conclude that the defendant Tesla through its CEO and engineers was acutely aware of the problem with the 'Autopilot' failing to detect cross traffic," the judge wrote.
The evidence also pointed to a disconnect between statements of Tesla CEO Elon Musk and what Tesla officials knew about problems with the Autopilot system, according to the opinion.
“Tesla could be facing a striking set of proceedings implicating its leadership and engineering,” Bryant Walker Smith, a law professor at the University of South Carolina, told the Florida Record in an email. “And those proceedings could take time, attention and other resources that the company would much rather direct internally.”
The bottom line of Scott’s ruling means that a reasonable jury could conclude that Tesla acted with gross negligence or in an intentionally wrongful way, according to Smith, who also noted that the company won two previous lawsuits alleging Autopilot feature defects.
But he characterized the judge’s summary of the evidence presented as significant.
“This evidence includes many dubious public statements by Elon Musk that the judge apparently considers relevant to this case,” Smith said. “It also includes depositions of Tesla employees, though not Musk himself, that suggest his close involvement in Tesla's Autopilot program.”
Even so, a future jury trial could produce a verdict favorable to Tesla, or the parties could opt for a settlement, he said.
“Crucially, 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.