Overview

• The parents of 19-year-old Krysta Tsukahara filed an Alameda County wrongful-death suit naming Tesla and alleging a rear-seat passenger could not escape because electronic locks failed when power was lost and the manual release was hard to access.
• According to the Cybertruck owner’s manual cited in the complaint, the rear manual release requires lifting a rubber mat, pulling a mechanical cable forward, and then pushing the door open.
• NHTSA opened a preliminary investigation last month into complaints about stuck Tesla doors, including reports of parents breaking windows to reach children.
• Tesla did not comment on the lawsuit, and its chief designer Franz von Holzhausen has said the company is developing door-release designs to make egress easier if a vehicle loses power.
• The November 2024 crash in Piedmont, California, killed three of four occupants, and toxicology reports later found the driver and other passengers had alcohol and drugs in their systems, according to the families’ lawyers.