The settlement amount was not disclosed, court documents say, and comes a day before the trial was set to begin.
By Trisha Thadani, The Washington PostThe logo for a Tesla Supercharger station is seen in Buford, Ga, April 22, 2021.
At issue was a fatal crash in March 2018, when a Tesla in Autopilot careened into a highway barrier near Mountain View, Calif., after getting confused by what the company’s lawyers described in court documents as a “faded and nearly obliterated” lane line. Walter Huang, a father of two and an Apple engineer on his morning commute, was allegedly playing a game on his phone while his Tesla steered itself down U.S. Route 101.
In addition to suing Tesla, Huang’s family also sued the state of California alleging the state failed to properly maintain the lane lines and also fix an already-damaged crash barrier in “a timely manner.” It is unclear what impact this settlement will have on that lawsuit.ADVERTISEMENT A key question in this case was whether those warnings were enough to spare the company from all liability when it knows about a shortcoming, but still puts the responsibility on the driver to correct for its mistakes. Tesla knew for years that faded lane lines could be a problem, according to complaints filed to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and deposition from top engineers at the company and federal investigators.
The outcomes of these trials are critical for the company’s future and for Musk, who has said that Tesla is “worth basically zero” if it cannot make its cars self-driving. The company’s Autopilot technology has been linked to more than 700 crashes since 2019 and at least 19 fatalities, according to a Washington Post analysis of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data.
Tesla’s legal position is that it repeatedly warns drivers they are ultimately in control of the vehicle, before and while using the Autopilot feature.
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