As a part of a deferred prosecution agreement, Cruise will even pay a $500,000 high-quality, the U.S. Attorney's Office said in an announcement Thursday.
“Today’s deferred prosecution agreement holds Cruise LLC and its employees accountable for their lack of candor in a federal compliance lawsuit,” said Cory LeGars, a special agent in command of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s inspector general. “Together with our law enforcement and prosecution partners, we will use our collective resources to pursue companies and individuals that intentionally circumvent the administration of federal regulations.”
The accident occurred on October 2, 2023 in San Francisco when a driverless cruise vehicle ran over a lady who was thrown into its path. The vehicle initially stopped; However, the detection system didn’t detect that there was a pedestrian underneath and attempted to stop, dragging the lady greater than 20 feet.
The pedestrian was hospitalized with life-threatening injuries and later agreed to a multimillion-dollar settlement with the corporate's parent company, General Motors Co.
Cruise filed a report with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration as required by federal regulations, but omitted details concerning the towing, prosecutors said.
Company officials later provided video of the incident that showed the pulling.
On Thursday, the U.S. Attorney's Office charged Cruise with providing false information to NHTSA with the intent to hinder, hinder or influence the investigation of an accident involving considered one of her vehicles. The company resolved the costs through the deferred prosecution agreement and half-million-dollar high-quality.
The agreement requires Cruise to cooperate with investigations, implement a security compliance program and submit annual reports on implementation and remedial actions.
If the corporate doesn’t comply with the agreement, the U.S. Attorney's Office can pursue the case.
Prosecutors said they reached the agreement with Cruise based on various aspects, including the federal government's timely notification of an internal investigation and the corporate's offer of cooperation after informing the federal government that it was conducting an investigation initiated.
Cruise's cooperation included remedial measures akin to ensuring that employees identified as answerable for the falsified report were not employed by the corporate.
NHTSA had previously ordered the corporate to pay a $1.5 million high-quality for failing to properly report details of the crash and supply a corrective motion plan.
After the accident, government regulators revoked Cruise's permit for driverless testing. The company then phased out its autonomous vehicles nationwide. Chief Executive Officer Kyle Vogt resigned, nine executives were fired and a couple of quarter of the workforce was laid off.
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