depends what she was told by the company I guess... and if he situation was avoidable at all
This is part of the general attitude that rights and freedoms don't matter if a machine violates them. When you walk out of a store post purchase and the security alarm goes off you have zero obligation to disclose what is now your property to the loss prevention experts. But somehow it's acceptable to assume you're a criminal because a machine said so.
Driving while watching a video certainly qualifies normally, but purely hypothetically, if Uber had internally said it was totally safe to drive distracted, then maybe she has a defense.
Only to a crime whose required mental state is intent, which rules out crimes of negligent or recklessness (or strict liability, for that matter.)
> The state has to provide criminal negligence, which in most states requires very risky behavior.
“A motorist can be convicted of negligent homicide for causing the death of another person while driving in a criminally negligent manner. A person acts with criminal negligence by unknowingly doing or failing to do something that creates a substantial and unjustifiable risk to others. The risk must be of such nature and degree that the failure to perceive it constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable person would use in like circumstances.”
https://www.drivinglaws.org/resources/arizonas-vehicular-hom...
I don't think that that's a hard fit for the publicly-reported facts of this case.
> Driving while watching a video certainly qualifies normally, but purely hypothetically, if Uber had internally said it was totally safe to drive distracted, then maybe she has a defense.
No, if “Uber” said that there is an even greater case than there already is under simple respondeat superior for the actions of the driver alone as agent of the firm for Uber to be charged with negligent homicide, manslaughter, or even 2nd degree murder.
But I don't think any representation by Uber could reduce the standard of care owed by a safety driver to members of the public to something below “not watching a video on the phone while supervising the safety of the operation of a self-driving vehicle”.
>I don't think that that's a hard fit for the publicly-reported facts of this case.
Agreed, unless (again 100% hypothetically) Uber misled the driver about the capabilities. Even then it would still require that a reasonable person would believe a (hypothetical) incorrect statement about the car's capability.
>No, if “Uber” said that there is an even greater case than there already is under simple respondeat superior for the actions of the driver alone as agent of the firm for Uber to be charged with negligent homicide, manslaughter, or even 2nd degree murder.
Not sure respondeat superior applies to criminal law. In either case, I think operating a fleet while (again 1000% hypothetically) misleading the drivers would be itself the act of criminal negligence. So I don't think you'd even need to resort to master/agent liability.
>But I don't think any representation by Uber could reduce the standard of care owed by a safety driver to members of the public to something below “not watching a video on the phone while supervising the safety of the operation of a self-driving vehicle”.
Not my area of expertise and I haven't looked at any case law on this point, but I think a believable statements made by Uber would be considered as the circumstances wrt "standard of care that a reasonable person would use in like circumstances."
If a reasonable person would believe it was safe to watch the video while driving, it wouldn't qualify as criminal negligence.
The reason why Uber had a human monitor, one required to have a valid motor vehicle license, is because of the potential lethal outcomes. You learn all of this when preparing to test for a license. It doesn't stop being one's responsibility to be a vigilant driver because it's convenient to do something else. Even considering the general stupidity levels of American drivers, ignorance of the law is no excuse.
What Uber (hypothetically might have) said is completely irrelevant; she was the driver, she is responsible.
IMO this is much more applicable to Uber's share of the responsibility for this incident.
I dont even know what license beyond a driving license exists for this job. Clearly not every driving license holder is fit to hold this position.
protip: You probably want to let them figure out what is the thing beeping while you're still in the shop. It's not great to get home only to realize that they forgot to take off the anti theft device on some of your beers.
lets just acknowledge inefficiencies in the system
I don't even know if an expert witness was there, thats how grand juries work.
And that a corporation didn't tell a full truth and threw an "maybe employee" under the bus? Not really that much to "posit".
Ironically also trending on HN at time of writing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24488350
When I saw the dashcam footage, I just thought to myself, I probably would have avoided that, had I been driving.
I've watched my own dashcam footage before and people on the periphery come out less visible than in reality because the headlights blow out the video - the camera has less dynamic range than our eyes.
Also trending on HN today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24488350
Oh, right...