A Tesla Inc. government mentioned Monday that the steering wheel of a automobile concerned in a lethal crash in Texas was “deformed,” and that it was probably there was somebody within the driver’s seat on the time of the crash — contradicting preliminary police reviews that mentioned nobody was behind the wheel.

Lars Moravy, Tesla’s vp of car engineering, mentioned on the automaker’s first quarter earnings call that following an examination of the crash, the corporate discovered “auto-steer didn’t and couldn’t interact” and that “adaptive cruise management solely engaged when the motive force was buckled and above 5 mph and it solely accelerated to 30 mph with a distance earlier than the automotive crashed.”

Moravy mentioned Tesla inspected the automotive with The Nationwide Transportation Security Board, NHTSA and native police and located “the steering wheel was certainly deformed, resulting in the chance that there was somebody within the driver’s seat on the time of the crash and all seatbelts post-crash had been discovered to be unbuckled.”

The April 17 accident concerned a 2019 Tesla Mannequin S that was touring at excessive pace close to Houston when it failed to barter a curve and went off the highway, crashing right into a tree and bursting into flames, native authorities mentioned.

Authorities situated two occupants within the automobile, one within the entrance passenger seat and the opposite within the again seat. The place of the victims, statements and different bodily proof counsel that “nobody was driving the automobile on the time of impression,” Harris County Precinct 4 Constable Mark Herman mentioned in a telephone interview with Reuters.

NHTSA and the NTSB each have mentioned they’re investigating the crash.

Musk, who subsequently tweeted that Tesla’s Autopilot driver-assist system was not engaged, mentioned on the decision Monday that there have been “actually simply extraordinarily misleading media practices” that claimed Autopilot was concerned.

“These journalists needs to be ashamed of themselves,” he mentioned.

Shopper Reviews issued a report following the crash exhibiting that Tesla automobiles will be tricked into working with Autopilot with out anybody within the driver’s seat.