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People give car fatalities in general a pass because it could be have been them driving.

If Waymo or a concurrent replace drivers, they don't get that free pass anymore, because the jury will not think it could have been them.

That would actually be a better situation to today's "free pass for everyone as long as no drug involved" that rules nowaday.

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This is basically the opposite of how juror psychology works. Jurors in these cases tend to vote against defendants they identify with because they prefer to believe they’d never act like the defendant. Source: I’m a former jury consultant who researched and consulted on these kinds of cases.

Most of these cases never make it to a jury or result in felony charges.

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