PHOENIX — The person behind the wheel of a self-driving Uber vehicle that fatally struck a woman in Tempe five years ago has pleaded guilty to endangerment.
Rafaela Vasquez was sentenced Friday to three years of supervised probation for her role in a collision that killed 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg in March 2018.
Herzberg was walking her bike along Mill Avenue outside of a crosswalk when she was hit by a self-driving Uber car operated by Vasquez.
Dash video from inside the car shows Vasquez looking down and the car not stopping on its own.
“During this testing phase, the company relied upon the defendant to be the eyes and ears while the vehicle was in operation, the defendant failed to do that," prosecutor Tiffany Brady said during Friday's court proceedings.
Prosecutors accused the defendant of watching television while operating the car, but Vasquez's attorneys claim the defendant was monitoring the car's systems.
"She was doing what she was asked to do, monitoring the system in the car," Al Morrison, Vasquez's attorney, said.
An NTSB report released in 2019 found that Vasquez had less than a second to react before the car hit Herzberg. However, the report found the car had been trying to figure out what Herzberg was for five seconds but never identified Herzberg as a person.
"There's responsibility involving everybody here," Morrison said during the proceedings Friday. "Including state government, including Uber, including my client, including Ms. Herzberg. I don't think that's disputed here."
Vasquez was initially charged with negligent homicide before taking the plea deal.
Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell released the following statement after Vasquez's court hearing:
“The defendant in this matter was responsible for the operation of a vehicle on our city streets that ended with a woman being killed. Determining an appropriate plea in this case involved considering a multitude of factors. We believe the Judge ordered an appropriate sentence based on the mitigating and aggravating factors.”
Uber was cleared of criminal charges in 2019 by the Yavapai County Attorney's Office. Herzberg's family reached a settlement with the ride-share company shortly after the fatal collision.
*Editor's Note: The above video is from an earlier broadcast.*
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What is the Valley?:
“The Valley” is what locals call the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. It is considered the largest metropolitan area in the Southwest.
The Valley is made up of various major cities other than Phoenix, including:
- Mesa
- Chandler
- Scottsdale
- Tempe
- Glendale
- Surprise
- Peoria
- Gilbert
- El Mirage
- Avondale
- Litchfield Park
- Goodyear
- Buckeye
Whether a city is in the “East Valley” or “West Valley” depends on where it is in relation to Phoenix.
The cities of the Valley have a combined population of 4,845,832 people, according to the 2020 United States Census. This makes it the 11th largest metropolitan area in the country right behind the Boston and Atlanta areas.
How big is Maricopa County?:
Maricopa County is the United States’ 4th largest county in terms of population with 4,485,414 people, according to the 2020 Census.
The county contains around 63% of Arizona’s population and is 9,224 square miles. That makes the county larger than seven U.S. states (Rhode Island, Delaware, Connecticut, Hawaii, New Jersey, Massachusetts and New Hampshire).
One of the largest park systems in the nation is also located in Maricopa County. The county has an estimated 120,000 acres of open space parks that includes hundreds of miles of trails, nature centers and campgrounds.
The county’s seat is located in Phoenix, which is also the state capital and the census-designated 5th most populous city in the United States.