Miami Jury: Tesla Only 1% To Blame Young Driver's Crash

A Florida jury  found Tesla was only 1% negligent in a violent crash that killed two teenagers by disabling the speed limiter on an electric car. 

Tuesday's ruling blamed the driver, Barrett Riley, and 9% went to his father, James Riley, who filed a lawsuit against Tesla. 

Michael Brooks, acting executive director of the Center for Automotive Safety, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, said this is the first known case involving a Tesla crash that has been brought forward. judge. 

Barrett Riley and her friend Edgar Monserrat Martinez were about to graduate from a South Florida private school  when they died in a crash in May 2018  near Fort Lauderdale Beach. One rear passenger was ejected and survived.  The National Transportation Safety Board determined that he was driving at 116 mph (186 km/h) in the 30 mph ( 8 km/h) zone, and the cause was most likely possible cause of the crash "is the  loss of control  of the driver due to excessive speed, speed". 

James Riley claimed the crash was "completely survivable" and  the  fire that followed killed the teenagers, but the judge dismissed his lawsuit that Tesla made lithium-ion batteries faulty to "explode into an uncontrollable and fatal fire" on impact.  

James Riley also said that Tesla removed a speed limiter without his permission. He installed the device to prevent his son from driving above 85 mph (136 km/h). An investigation found that about a month before the crash, the teenager asked employees of a Tesla dealership in Dania Beach  to put the car into normal operation mode while it was being serviced. 

Tesla has denied negligence in disabling the speed limiter. The company argued that the teenager's parents were negligent in allowing him to operate the vehicle "while they were aware of his history of speeding and reckless driving", following the  instructions of the previous judge. jury. 

Brooks of the Center for Automotive Safety said other lawsuits are pending against Tesla related to the vehicle's fully autonomous and autonomous driving system. 

The jurors offered the teenager's mother Jenny Riley $6 million for the pain and suffering.

But the allocation of liability means Tesla will only be liable for $105,000, or 1% of the negligence identified in the ruling, according to Curt Miner, an attorney representing the Riley family.