Legal Dustup Over Cost Of Accident Involving Driverless Car With Human Test Driver

A driverless car company operating in San Francisco and a company that supplied it human test drivers have taken a dispute over who should pay for an accident to federal court.

The case seems likely to prove that no matter how many human drivers are displaced by autonomous driving technology, at least an equal number of jobs will be created for lawyers.

The autonomous car company Cruise LLC sued Thursday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco claiming that Actalent Inc., a Maryland company that provided test drivers for its vehicles, should pay for the cost of a 2019 accident.

The dispute arises from a collision on Sept. 5, 2019, when Jonas Judd, a San Francisco resident, was on a scooter stopped at a red light, facing south, at the intersection of Gough, Haight and Market streets.