PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona Uber driver involved in the first death linked to a fully autonomous vehicle will face trial in June for negligent homicide.
Rafaela Vasquez, 49, was previously scheduled to die next month in the March 2018 crash that killed 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg when she walked a bicycle outside the lines of a crosswalk in Tempe, Arizona. Vasquez’s trial was moved for a brief hearing on Tuesday.
Vasquez, who has pleaded not guilty to the charges, told police that Herzberg “came out of nowhere” and that she had not seen her prior to the hit-and-run.
Authorities say Vasquez was streaming the TV show “The Voice” on a phone and looking down moments before Uber’s Volvo XC-90 SUV collided with Herzberg. But Vasquez’s lawyers said their client was watching a messaging activity used by Uber employees on a work cell phone perched on her right knee. “The Voice” was playing on Vasquez’s personal cell phone, who was in the passenger seat, they said.
Prosecutors declined to file criminal charges against Uber over Herzberg’s death after the National Transportation Safety Board concluded that the primary cause of the crash was Vasquez’s failure to monitor the road.
The Arizona crash wasn’t the first to involve an Uber autonomous test vehicle. In March 2017, an Uber SUV overturned on its side, also in Tempe. There were no serious injuries and the driver of the other car received a report. Herzberg’s trial will take place in Phoenix.
Herzberg’s death was the first involving an autonomous test vehicle, but not the first in a car with some self-driving capabilities. The driver of a Tesla Model S was killed in 2016 when his car, operating on its autopilot system, crashed into a semi-trailer in Florida.
