“Autopilot Abuse”: Offender Caught Sleeping In Tesla Doing 82MPH Had Been Caught Twice Before

ZeroHedge.com

Third time’s a charm…

A man was pulled over on May 16th by the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Office, who had been alerted to “a man in a black Tesla” who was “asleep at the wheel” on the interstate.

When a patrol car found the vehicle on the interstate, they noticed “the man at the wheel had his eyes lowered and his head turned, giving the distinct impression that he was not paying attention to the road,” according to autoevolution.

The officer then put his lights on, before following the Tesla for two miles, waiting for the “driver” to wake up. Once he finally noticed that an officer was attempting to pull him over, the driver denied sleeping at the wheel and simply claimed he was “a little bit tired”.

Kenosha County Sheriff’s official release said:

The deputy approached the vehicle from behind and pulled alongside it to observe the driver. According to the deputy, the driver did appear to be asleep noting that the driver’s head was down and was not looking at the road.

The deputy initiated a traffic stop activating his lights and siren. The deputy advised that the driver was not pulling over as he followed behind it for approximately 2 miles at 82 mph through Kenosha County. The deputy reported that the driver finally noticed that he was being stopped when the deputy pulled alongside of the Tesla for the second time and pulled over near CTH KR.

The operator and sole occupant of the Tesla was identified as a 38-year-old man out of Palatine, IL. The operator was questioned and denied being asleep.

The deputy responded: “No, you were sleeping, sir. I was on the side of you. I was looking at you and you were doing this. Your eyes were closed. So I know, I understand you have autopilot, but if something was to happen, you’re not able to make that conscious decision to stop in a hurry.”

The driver said he worked as a UPS driver and hadn’t been drinking or taking drugs. He continued to insist he wasn’t sleeping and was let go, after being cited for inattentive driving.

After the story broke, CNN reported that the driver was a third time offender: he had been pulled over for sleeping while his Tesla drove on Autopilot in February 2021 and August 2020. 

It is the latest brick in the wall of what autoevolution calls a “worrisome pattern of Autopilot abuse” – one that we have been documenting for years on Zero Hedge and one that the NHTSA still, to this day, seems less than interested in addressing in any serious fashion.