10 months ago
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Cruise, the GM self-driving subsidiary, said Thursday that federal prosecutors and securities regulators have opened investigations into the October 2 incident that left a pedestrian stuck under and then dragged by one of its robotaxis.
The probes by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission, which were revealed as part of an internal report released Thursday, join numerous other investigations at nearly every level of government, including the California Department of Motor Vehicles, the California Public Utilities Commission and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The October 2 incident — and the decisions by Cruise leadership in the days following — has put the company’s future at risk. Cruise lost permits to operate commercially in the state of California — and has since grounded its fleet elsewhere. Its co-founder and CEO Kyle Vogt resigned and nearly 24% of its workforce had been laid off in the wake of the event.
Now, an internal report conducted by Quinn Emanuel shows how a lack of judgement, and missteps by leadership, an “us versus them” relationship with regulators and a fixation on correcting the inaccurate media narrative that the Cruise AV, not the Nissan, had caused the accident were all contributing factors to Cruise’s problems, according to the 195-page report.
“This myopic focus led Cruise to convey the information about the Nissan hit-and-run driver having caused the Accident to the media, regulators, and other government officials, but to omit other important information about the Accident. Even after obtaining the Full Video, Cruise did not correct the public narrative but continued instead to share incomplete facts and video about the Accident with the media and the public. This conduct has caused both regulators and the media to accuse Cruise of misleading them.”
Cruise must take decisive steps to address these issues in order to restore trust and credibility.
