Tesla Driver Charged with Manslaughter After Crash Kills Woman in Her Home
A Tesla Model 3 driver using Full Self-Driving mode has been charged with manslaughter after crashing into a Texas home and killing an elderly woman.
The Harris County Sheriff's Office has filed a criminal complaint against Michael Butler, who last month was driving a Tesla Model 3 in Full Self-Driving mode when he caused a high-speed crash in Katy, Texas, resulting in the death of Martha Avila.
According to the complaint, Butler was making DoorDash deliveries and stepped on the accelerator, overriding the self-driving system. Days after the incident, Tesla's vice president of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, posted on X that "the driver manually overrode self-driving by pressing the accelerator all the way to 100 percent" and "reached a speed of 73 mph during the crash."
The sheriff's office obtained written consent from the driver to search and seize the Tesla and his cellphone. The phone contained multiple Google searches about Full Self-Driving, including "tesla fsd not aggressive enough 2026 model," "FSD is not aggressive enough for city driving," and "tesla fsd too timid."
Court records show Butler is being held in the Harris County jail on a $150,000 bond. In addition to the criminal charge, Avila's family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Tesla for defective design and against the driver for negligence. Tesla also faces a new special investigation from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which has previously probed the company and its Full Self-Driving technology.
