It seems perverse that mere ownership of something can create liability.
If she had failed to get some maintenance that made the car dangerous to drive, that would be one thing. But there is no indication that this is the case.
If a psychopath rents a VHS from Blockbuster and then uses it to bludgeon someone's head in, is Blockbuster liable for that act of violence? Sure, a VHS is not intended to be used this way, but a car is not intended to be crashed either.
She has clear liability. She agreed, after reviewing the request, to rent her car, for a profit, to someone who was a reckless driver and did serious harm to others (and, sadly, himself). I hate the U.S. tort system but some liability in this case is pretty reasonable.
> The problem is that it's not a person driving, it's a vehicle that's property of a company. If that vehicle kills someone, the company is responsible. Who goes to prison?
If a car causes injury or death or property damage due to a manufacturing defect, then there is chain-of-commerce liability for everyone between the manufacturer and the buyer, most jurisdictions make the operator responsible for assuring it is maintained in safe condition as well. And none of these liabilities excluded the others.
But, no, usually, unless there is an unusual degree of intentionaloty and/or deception, no one will go to prison.
In that case, I think you have a point. However, consider these situations:
* Honda made their car poorly and there are sharp edges at the fenders, and the driver purposely used those to injure someone. I think Honda should still have some liability; their poor construction resulted in extra injury, regardless of the application.
* Honda intentionally or with recklessness built the car in a way that would serve as a useful tool for murder, in ways that served no worthwhile purpose, in ways that could be secured. I don't know the law exactly, but I expect Honda would be liable, and IMHO that would be absolutely right.
Still, if Honda builds a safe car and someone simply chooses to use its mass x acceleration to kill someone, then I wouldn't hold Honda liable.
> then how could you possibly, in good faith, be hold liable for this?
Because you're the person responsible for the vehicle. That's literally what "responsible" means. It's your job as a car owner to ensure situations like this, where you don't know who was driving, don't happen.
This seems contrived to me. Cars frequently break down, get flooded, hit deer or other cars, get hit by trees, etc without their owners suddenly becoming destitute.
More to the point, if some other driver isn't paying attention and damages your car to the point it's inoperable, are you justified in shooting them? In most cases, they won't face any criminal liability even (perhaps a minor ticket).
Also: bludgeoning someone to death is not an inherent risk of operation of a VHS tape. A fatal car crash is an undesired, but extremely common, foreseeable, and mostly unavoidable risk inherent in the operation of a car.
Surely not? Cars are routinely driven by people who are not owners, and liability for traffic offences (including that the vehicle must be insured) is with the driver.
Sure - and I won't argue about whether it counts as "contributory negligence" if you park your nice car unlocked in sketchy areas and it gets stolen (and I'm sure you'll be hearing that from your insurance company if it's you).
But if your sister/girlfriend/wife/mother is assaulted in the street and I said to you "what the hell did you expect was going to happen, that's on you" - I'd fully expect you to punch me in the face. (And yes, I realise the hypocrisy in that - welcome to the inconsistency of being a human being...)
> this wouldn't be criminal behavior if committed by a human
I can assure you that a human who is driving carelessly would be held criminal liable. Why do you assume an accident that was severe enough to have resulted in a persons death—the car didn’t just scrape them because they ran across the street—is not due to a reckless programming?
>Short answer is “yes” same way a homeowner can be responsible if they negligently leave some issues on their property and a person falls to their death.
There's a lot of gray area in those kinds of cases. The idea that one is negligent because one could have done something differently tends to permeate internet circle jerks about legal responsibility but these sorts of things tend to be very specific to the facts in question and the burdens of proof differ greatly between civil lawsuits and criminal prosecutions.
In this case the driver will probably be probably be financially responsible for the outcome but being found guilty of manslaughter is a much higher bar. However, many states have various vehicular <type of crime> statutes with lower requirements or "but if driving a vehicle then X" type qualifiers on the definitions of normal crimes so that may complicate things.
> That's the thing - you're not. Once engaged, Mercedes takes liability, so you're no longer responsible.
Legally (though surely to be tested in court).
Morally though, I'd say the driver is still responsible if they kill someone. It doesn't feel right to say "Oh well, it's Mercedes' fault, shrug" after your car with you in it drives over someone else.
If she had failed to get some maintenance that made the car dangerous to drive, that would be one thing. But there is no indication that this is the case.
If a psychopath rents a VHS from Blockbuster and then uses it to bludgeon someone's head in, is Blockbuster liable for that act of violence? Sure, a VHS is not intended to be used this way, but a car is not intended to be crashed either.
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