The jury's holding both Tesla and the driver liable means
that it found each was negligent and that the negligent conduct of each was a
cause of the harms to the plaintiffs. I believe this is correct.
This Florida case is similar to but significantly different
from the actual legal case, Saunders
System Birmingham Co. v. Adams, 217 Ala. 621, 117 So. 72 (Ala. 1928), which is the basis for the
often used hypothetical regarding multiple omissions (overdetermined negative
causation), which both I and Mehdi discussed last week.
As I stated last week,
omissions, as occurred in Saunders and this Florida case, usually are
negative causes, which contribute to the relevant harm by causing the failure
of a positive causal process (here, braking) that would have prevented the
positive causal process of the moving (speeding) car's crashing into and
harming the victims. When there is an overdetermined failure of the braking
process due to multiple omissions with respect to the conditions needed for it
to be fully instantiated (work), the first omission that irretrievably causes
the failure of the braking process is a negative cause of its failure and thus
of the car's smashing into some one or some thing. You cannot cause the failure
of an already failed causal process.
In Saunders the
auto rental company allegedly failed to properly maintain/repair the brakes, so
they would not work, but the driver failed to attempt to use them and the car
struck and injured the victim. This case is commonly described, erroneously, as
one in which the brakes were defective but the court ruled that the auto rental
company was not liable since the injury would have happened anyway, which would
be a misapplication of the but-for test of causation to an overdetermined
causation situation. The court actually held that there was insufficient
evidence to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the brakes were
defective. Apparently, only the auto rental company was sued. See report of the case at https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3236472/saunders-system-birmingham-co-v-adams/. Assuming the brakes were
defective, that defect irretrievably caused the failure of the braking process
and was a cause of the accident and the victim's injury; the driver's failure
to try to brake was not a cause.
In the Florida case, Tesla's design negligently (a) failed
to include a means to ensure that the driver kept his eyes on the road and (b)
failed to ensure operation of the brakes when there is a pending collision,
instead allowing the driver to override the automatic braking by pressing on
the accelerator. The driver negligently failed to keep his eyes on the road,
instead bending down to retrieve his dropped phone. He was going too fast and
failed to see the upcoming T-intersection or the stop sign.