"Speeding With Self-Driving On"... Tesla Driver Indicted for Negligent Homicide After Crashing Into House

Model 3 Crash in Texas
System Overridden by Manual Pedal Operation

A driver has been indicted on charges of negligent homicide after a Tesla vehicle crashed into a house in Texas, resulting in the death of a resident in their 70s. Although the driver claimed to have been using the 'supervised Full Self-Driving (FSD)' feature at the time of the accident, the investigation revealed that he had overridden the system by manually operating the pedals and speeding.

According to reports from Yonhap News Agency and The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on July 3, law enforcement authorities indicted Michael David Butler, 44, on charges of negligent homicide in connection with the incident on June 19, when a Tesla Model 3 crashed into a brick house in Katy, near Houston, Texas, killing a resident in their 70s.

Tesla Logo. Photo by Reuters and Yonhap News Agency

Butler told police and paramedics that he was making deliveries and operating the vehicle in FSD mode when he changed the music on the touchscreen and subsequently lost consciousness.

However, after securing and reviewing the vehicle's black box and other evidence, investigators determined that Butler had repeatedly pressed the accelerator pedal in the residential area where the accident occurred, thereby disabling the default FSD speed setting.

The vehicle at one point reached a speed of 117 km/h, which is more than double the speed limit for that residential area. Additionally, during the final minute before the crash, the brake pedal was never engaged. The investigation also revealed that Butler had repeatedly searched on Google for information related to his dissatisfaction that the FSD was not ‘aggressive’ enough.

Tesla vehicles come equipped with an autopilot feature that maintains the distance between cars, but drivers can also opt for the FSD function, which uses artificial intelligence (AI) to handle tasks from lane changes to driving itself, requiring only driver supervision.

In the United States, there has been ongoing controversy and lawsuits, as this feature has led to misunderstandings among consumers that fully autonomous driving is possible, resulting in accidents. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has been investigating more than 40 crashes involving advanced driver-assistance systems, including FSD.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.