Tesla accused of misrepresenting Autopilot in Florida crash lawsuit

Autopilot driver-assist system.

Shawn Hudson, represented by the Morgan & Morgan law firm, has filed suit against Tesla in Orange County, Florida, seeking damages related to an automobile crash on Florida's Turnpike. Morgan & Morgan alleges that Tesla "has duped consumers" into believing Autopilot is more capable than the automaker claims.

Here's what happened. Morgan was driving his Tesla Model on Florida's Turnpike (State Road 91) between his home in Winter Garden and his job at Nissan Dealership in Fort Pierce. He is on the road to reducing the tide of his 125-mile commute, but the Model is approaching the left side of the battlefield, destroying the Tesla's front end and leaving Hudson with "severe" permanent injuries, "according to the complaint.

In addition to the accounts of liability, negligence and misrepresentation filed against Tesla, the report alleges negligence against the owner of the vehicle for leaving it in the roadway.

"In this case, the car was unable to transmit data to our servers, which has prevented us from reporting the vehicle from the accident," Tesla spokesperson said in an emailed statement. "However, we have no reason to believe that Autopilot malfunctioned or operated other than as designed."

The statement also stressed that driver vigilance remains paramount. "When using Autopilot, it is the driver's responsibility to remain attentive to all of them, and Tesla has always been clear that it is not an accident, and Tesla goes to great lengths. to provide clear instructions about what Autopilot is and is not. "

To that end, the owner of the Model S did admit to the Orlando Sentinel that he was looking at his phone while Autopilot was enabled. "But never do I trust the car 100 percent, so I was looking up, looking down, looking up, looking down, and I'm looking at the turnpike," Hudson told the Sentinel. Florida law making phone calls while driving, but texting while driving is illegal.

Mike Morgan, the Morgan & Morgan attorney representing Hudson, criticized Tesla's statement in a phone call to Roadshow. "To me, that [response] is just puzzling, "Morgan said." If that's how [Autopilot] "It's supposed to be used, and it's supposed to function, they have a huge problem."

The incident alleges that the sales representative of the Hudson's Islands visited the Tesla store and visited it with the knowledge that he was able to use it. Morgan said it was much in his phone call with Roadshow, but he believes the company has mischaracterized its capabilities up and down the ranks, from how the automaker arranges its promotional materials to sales pitched it.

This is not the first lawsuit to make this claim. Tesla was sued in Utah in September after a driver's Model S crashed into a fire truck stopped at a red light. Autopilot was enabled at the time, and the driver was allegedly under the impression that the vehicle would stop for all blockages in the car's path.

Following some high-profile crashes featuring Autopilot, Autopilot and other technologies (like autobrake). Long story short, systems are designed to ignore stationary objects on the road. The feature also makes this line of thinking "no longer makes sense" because drivers can be lulled "to a false sense of security and cause them to pay closer attention to the road."

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