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The First Person Ever To Die In a Tesla Is a Guy Who Stole One
mrspoonsi sends this news from The Verge:
Elon Musk can no longer say that no one's ever died in a Tesla automobile crash. But few people will be pointing fingers at the electric car maker for this senseless tragedy. Earlier this month, 26-year-old Joshua Slot managed to successfully ride off with a Model S he'd stolen from a Tesla service center in Los Angeles, but police quickly spotted the luxury vehicle and gave chase. According to Park Labrea News, the high-speed pursuit was eventually called off after officers were involved in a fender bender of their own, leaving the police department strained for resources and without any feasible way of catching up to Slot. Reports claim he was traveling at speeds of "nearly 100 mph," but losing the police tail apparently didn't convince Slot to hit the brakes. Instead he sped on, eventually colliding with three other vehicles and a pair of street poles. The final impact was severe enough to "split the Tesla in half" and eject Slot from the car's remains. The Tesla's front section wound up in the middle of the road and caught fire. Its rear portion flew through the air with such force that it slammed into the side of a local Jewish community center and became wedged there.
Considering he was thrown from the vehicle (likely from not wearing a seatbelt) I'm not sure you could say he died 'in' a Tesla.
So, assuming he wasn't already dead, technically he didn't die in the Tesla.
I eat only the real part of complex carbohydrates.
from summary: The Tesla's front section wound up in the middle of the road and caught fire.
Yup, another tesla fire.
Well, that was an electrifying story! I really got a charge out of it.
So at times the Tesla was being driven at speeds up to 100 MPH, collided with three cars and two utility poles along the way, and eventually suffered an impact that split the car in two, immolating the front half and embedding the back half within a nearby building.
Can't people see how dangerous and unsafe these vehicles are?!?
If something as trivial as multiple high-speed impacts can lead to driver fatality, imagine what could happen in a REALLY serious accident!
When the police called off the chase (for other reasons) and he kept going at 100+mph, there's no "punishment" involved, let alone capital punishment. This is a Darwin Award pure and simple, pure suicide-by-stupid.
I do agree that police chases are a spectacle who's time has long-sinced passed, but you mention drones as a means of tracking them, and they're now "teh new evil" no matter what purpose they're put to by authorities, so until the country gets a little less schizophrenic I don't see that changing.
Having had the experience of having my own performance car stolen temporarily, and damaging it to the extent of needing a new engine and reupholstering, at the time I felt capital punishment is not enough.
You may think this is a little severe, but people who are into cars feel they have had part of their soul ripped out of them if it is stolen and trashed, especially if it is their personal hobby and they are doing it at the limits of their budget.
I understand that many people attach a lot of their self-image to their vehicles, and devote disproportionate time, attention, and money to them. That doesn't mean that their priorities should be encoded into law.
Your hobby is not more important to society in general than human life. Yes, it may be more important to you than some other person's life. Laws exist partly to mediate between people's conflicting self-interest.
I guess they can also charge him with "leaving the scene of a crime"
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Minor collision? The BusinessInsider source claims the pursuing officers had to be hospitalized. That doesn't sound "minor" to me.
And they only broke off pursuit when it became impossible for them to continue, not when it became unsafe. Many police departments now have a policy of not performing chases for non-violent crimes because, statistically, you're more likely to kill bystanders by chasing than by letting the criminal drive off.