The incident involved concerns a fatal accident involving a driverless vehicle owned by the defendant. Ms Potential was tragically killed by this vehicle.

Ms Potential was an up and coming 35 year-old woman who founded a new company. She was married with two children. Her company had turned a profit of $50,000 for the last year but had some new ventures that offered a potential for a lot more. She was hit and killed apparently coming out of a coffee shop across the street from her office. There were all parked cars along both sides of the road in this area. We know that she had a very important meeting in her office scheduled around the time of her death.

There was no one in the driverless vehicle at the time of the accident. There was a witness in the car coming from the other direction. The driver in this other car saw Ms Potential on the opposite side of the road between several parked cars. This witness then saw the approaching driverless vehicle about 1000' from Ms Potential. This witness did not see the actual impact.

The Defendant is Drives Itself Co., a manufacturer of driverless vehicles. This vehicle had a lot of technology with, among other things, a sensor on the roof of the vehicle and in the front of the vehicle. There were no prior accidents with any of its driverless vehicles.

The Estate of Ms Potential has brought a lawsuit against Drives Itself Co.. The lawsuit is based on products liability, namely the driverless vehicle was defective.

This case has gone through the pleadings and discovery stages and is now down for a settlement conference.

Please assume that the future value of money is the same as today because the inflation rate equals the discount rate. So, in other words, $50,000 two years from now is worth the same as today.

Attached is the defendant's position paper. Your assignment is to discuss how you would negotiate a settlement of this tort case on the most favorable terms to the defendant.

Defendant's Position Paper

The Defendant manufactured the driverless vehicle and it went through extensive testing. However, no testing ever proved the vehicle could handle the incident that happened here. There was no feature to slow down when driving through parked cars along a street.

The Defendant believes that it can possibly prove there was no defect and Ms Potential was also negligent either barring or reducing her recovery. (In this jurisdiction, if the defendant proves the plaintiff's negligence was more than 50% of the total, then the Plaintiff obtains nothing and if this is not proved but there was still some negligence on the part of the Plaintiff, the Plaintiff's recovery is reduced accordingly. So, if the Plaintiff is 40% negligent, the Plaintiff only gets a judgement for 60% of the total awarded.)

However, the Defendant has the following issues:

1. Lack of Testing. The Defendant is concerned that without any tests proving the driverless vehicle could handle this accident, it could be concluded that there was a defect in the vehicle.
2. Witness Statement. The Defendant is also concerned that the witness indicated that when she first saw Ms Potential on the other side of the street between the parked cars, the driverless vehicle still had about 1,000', plenty of time to stop if it was not going too fast for the conditions.
3. The cost of defense for this case has been huge. The Defendant does not have insurance for this. The following is the breakdown:
4. Pleadings- $50,000
5. Discovery- $150,000
6. Expert witness- $25,000
7. Pretrial Proceeding- $25,000
8. Trial- $100,000

So, given the stage the proceedings are at, the Defendant has incurred $225,000 with $125,000 to go, not considering any appeals.

1. The Defendant does not want a judgement entered against it for fear it will open the flood gates and more suits will be brought using this case as an example. So, basically, a settlement is needed.