Tesla Settles Another Fatality Case Out of Court

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to trial later this year.

Probably a good due to the unpopularity of Musk and large settlement juries hand out.

And the legal environment seems to have changed.
Drivers and victims involved in those crashes have often sued Tesla, but the automaker has managed to have the cases dismissed, placing most of the blame on the drivers.

However, things started to change over the last year.

Last year, Tesla settled a wrongful death lawsuit involving a crash on Autopilot that happened in 2018, and last month, the automaker lost its first trial over a crash that occurred in Florida in 2019.

For the first time, a case went to trial before a jury, and they decided to assign a third of the blame for the crash to Tesla for the role Autopilot played. The rest of the blame was assigned to the driver, who had already settled with the victims and their families before the Tesla trial began.

The jury awarded the plaintiffs $243 million. The automaker has made clear its intentions to appeal the verdict.

Before the trial, the plaintiffs offered Tesla to settle for $60 million, and the company refused.

The trial process cost them much more.

The jury didn’t buy Tesla’s usual argument that it couldn’t be blamed because it clearly informs the driver that they are always responsible for the vehicle. The plaintiffs’ lawyers successfully argued that Tesla was careless in the way it deployed Autopilot, without implementing geofencing and marketing it to customers in a manner that encouraged the abuse of the system.

The above lawsuit will likely result in more lawsuits. Better to break out the checkbook early to reduce cost & hopefully limit the bad press.

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Actually, two cases were settled. Not surprising that Electrek missed one.

On a side note, I did a road trip last extended weekend. I don’t have FSD, but I do have the latest AutoPilot. When I pressed the accelerator, I got a message on the screen telling me “Accelerator pedal pressed. Car will not brake.”

If I continued to press the accelerator, that message would be highlighted and have it’s background flash on the screen. Pretty hard to ignore, unless you’re eyes on the floor looking for your dropped cell phone.

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Or are in the back seat taking a nap. :wink:
Never underestimate the stupidity of some humans.

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Marketing indeed.

“Feature complete” and “solved problem” (solved today by Waymo)

So in a sense, Musk was correct that autonomous driving is a “solved problem.” Just not by him.

  • January 2016: “In ~2 years, summon should work anywhere connected by land & not blocked by borders, eg you’re in LA and the car is in NY.”
  • June 2016: “I really would consider autonomous driving to be basically a solved problem. . . . I think we’re basically less than two years away from complete autonomy, complete—safer than a human. However regulators will take at least another year.”
  • October 2016: By the end of 2017 Tesla will demonstrate a fully autonomous drive from “a home in L.A., to Times Square . . . without the need for a single touch, including the charging.”
  • March 2018: “I think probably by end of next year [end of 2019] self-driving will encompass essentially all modes of driving”
  • February 2019: “I think we will be feature complete—full self-driving—this year. Meaning the car will be able to find you in a parking lot, pick you up, take you all the way to your destination without an intervention, this year."

I’m going to stop the litany here, but it continued.

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I sincerely doubt it is a solved problem. Even in ideal circumstances, there are problems. This is a few years old. It’s probably out there somewhere to view (doesn’t appear on the NOVA website anymore).

Five years is forever in high-tech. I suspect many of the same problems still exist. We have Waymo in Phoenix. Over 300 days of sunshine, no snow or ice, not much rain, streets are mostly a grid pattern. Probably the easiest scenario of Waymo (or Tesla). But can it operate in Chicago or Minneapolis in winter? Can it not hit the guy carrying a pizza box on his shoulder (you’d have to view the program to get that reference)?

A quick search shows that Apple TV may have the program. It shattered a lot of my illusions about “auto-pilot” driving.

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Here’s a link to a Reuters article on the 2 cases:

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-settles-two-lawsuits-2019-california-crashes-related-autopilot-software-2025-09-16/

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Tesla settling another fatality case highlights the ongoing tension between innovation and accountability. As an investor, I see these settlements as both a financial and reputational risk. While they avoid lengthy court battles, they also raise questions about long-term safety perception. For shareholders, the bigger issue is whether Tesla can maintain public trust while scaling autonomous tech—because reputation directly influences future adoption and stock value.

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As long as Tesla has deep pockets and America has ambulance chasing lawyers these cases will continue. Money talks!

What I would like to know is why Tesla is setting instead of fighting.

The Captain

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Occam’s razor suggests that it’s because they believe there’s a material chance that they would lose.

In the case where they did go to trial, they ended up being found liable. So the simplest explanation is that their lawyers have assessed the claims against them and advised that the plaintiffs have a case with a good chance of winning.

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Sounds plausible. My next question, how much of it is politics and Musk hate?

The Captain

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Probably none of it. These lawsuits would have happened regardless. If someone gets killed or hurt in a car crash, the injured will always file suit against everyone involved. There’s no way that Tesla doesn’t get sued, even if everyone loved Musk and his politics. The injury/death happens, the devastated family hires a lawyer, and anyone with a deep pocket who might possibly have contributed to the incident will get named in the suit.

Tesla and Musk were very…. well, let’s just say they weren’t exactly cautious in branding and publicly promoting Autopilot back in the day. That might have sped interest in the product, but it exposes them to these claims that they misled drivers as to the system’s capabilities. That’s what’s causing them problems, and it would exist regardless of Musk’s political forays.

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The lawsuits (ambulance chasers), yes, the verdicts not so sure.

The Captain

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Tesla sought dismissal, but the judge allowed it to proceed, and the case was set for trial on November 11.

Despite this aggressive defense, Tesla didn’t let a jury decide the case.

Days before the trial was set to start, Tesla’s lawyers quietly filed a “Notice of Settlement” on November 6, 2025. The document simply states that “the parties in the above-captioned case have reached a settlement”. The terms, as usual, are not disclosed in the filing.

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