Man charged with manslaughter over Tesla crash originally blamed on car’s self-driving mode

A man whose Tesla Model 3 was allegedly in self-driving mode when it crashed into a home near Houston and killed a 76-year-old woman inside recently has been jailed on a count of manslaughter.Michael Butler’s arrest in the 19 June death of Martha Avila was announced late on Wednesday in a Facebook post by the sheriff of Harris county, Texas, Ed Gonzalez.Butler, 44, remained in the custody of Gonzalez’s office as of Friday morning in lieu of $150,000 bail, jail records showed. He had a court hearing tentatively scheduled for 6 July.His arrest came amid a case that has drawn federal investigators’ scrutiny as well as a wrongful death lawsuit from Avila’s family.Butler was traveling in his Tesla at about 8pm local time in the Houston suburb of Katy when the car allegedly plowed through the front wall of Avila’s home, fatally pinning her.Investigators said Butler, who was injured in the wreck, showed no signs of intoxication and was cooperating with investigators. He allegedly told sheriff’s deputies that he was using Self-driving technology with which the car was equipped, but it has not been clear what – if any – role it played in the deadly crash.Prior to Butler’s arrest on suspicion of manslaughter, Tesla’s vice-president of artificial intelligence software, Ashok Elluswamy, posted on X that the driver involved in Avila’s death “manually overrode self-driving by pressing the accelerator all the way to 100% of the accel pedal in [the] residential area”.Tesla’s CEO, trillionaire Elon Musk, similarly had posted on X – which he also owns – that “this was a high speed crash!”Texas law defines manslaughter as recklessly causing the death of an individual. It is treated as a second-degree felony in many cases and can carry a penalty of between two and 10 years in prison.Lawyers for Avila’s family have previously said they filed a civil complaint on 23 June contending that Tesla – Musk’s electric vehicle manufacturer – should be held liable for her death. They also named Butler as a defendant.The lawsuit alleged gross negligence in Avila’s death, along with a failure to warn that the Tesla Model 3’s “autopilot” and “full self-driving systems” were defective.One day after the filing of the wrongful death lawsuit by Avila’s family, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it was launching an investigation into the crash. That was two days after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said it was investigating the crash too.Those inquiries joined a steadily growing number of investigations aimed at Tesla.Since 2016, as Reuters has reported, the NHTSA has opened nearly 50 special investigations into Tesla crashes believed to involve advanced driver-assistance systems. About two dozen deaths from those crashes were reported.And the NHTSA in March escalated its investigation into 3.2m Teslas equipped with full ⁠Self-driving technology over concerns that the system may fail to detect or warn drivers in poor visibility.Tesla ​in 2023 recalled about 2m cars, nearly ​all of its electric vehicles on US roads, ​to better ensure that drivers pay attention when using the autopilot feature. Tesla has said the technology enables vehicles to steer, ​accelerate and brake within the ‌lanes they are traveling. And full self-driving ​lets vehicles obey traffic signals as well as change lanes, the manufacturer has said.Both technologies still require “fully attentive” drivers whose hands are on the cars’ steering wheels, Tesla has added.In early 2025, Tesla car sales plunged and its stock fell as a result of a boycott against Musk in the wake of his wading into US federal politics. He temporarily led the Trump administration’s budget-cutting “department of government efficiency” (Doge) initiative, and he also embraced extremist political candidates in Europe.But strong figures reported on Thursday suggested Tesla’s auto business has been regaining momentum.Reuters contributed reporting