Next A jury in Florida awarded plaintiffs $329 million in damages on Friday in a case that blamed Tesla’s Autopilot driver assistance feature for a 2019 crash that killed a young woman and gravely injured her boyfriend. By: and last updated A jury in Florida awarded plaintiffs $329 million in damages on Friday in a case that blamed Tesla’s Autopilot driver assistance feature for a 2019 crash that killed a young woman and gravely injured her boyfriend. Tesla has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in the case and said it plans to appeal the decision. The company released the following statement after the jury's decision: "Today’s verdict is wrong and only works to set back automotive safety and jeopardize Tesla’s and the entire industry’s efforts to develop and implement life-saving technology. We plan to appeal given the substantial errors of law and irregularities at trial. Even though this jury found that the driver was overwhelmingly responsible for this tragic accident in 2019, the evidence has always shown that this driver was solely at fault because he was speeding, with his foot on the accelerator – which overrode Autopilot – as he rummaged for his dropped phone without his eyes on the road. To be clear, no car in 2019, and none today, would have prevented this crash. This was never about Autopilot; it was a fiction concocted by plaintiffs’ lawyers blaming the car when the driver – from day one – admitted and accepted responsibility." The crash involved a Tesla Model S whose driver had been using the car's Autopilot technology in the moments before he smashed into an SUV in Key Largo, Florida. The driver of the Model S said he reached down to pick up his cellphone, taking his eyes off the road and colliding with the parked SUV.