Driver in fatal Uber autonomous crash set for June trial

PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona Uber driver involved in the first death connected to a fully autonomous vehicle will be tried in June on a negligent homicide charge. 

Rafaela Vasquez, 49, previously had been scheduled for trial next month in the March 2018 crash that killed 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg as she walked a bicycle outside the lines of a crosswalk in Tempe, Arizona. Vasquez's trial was rescheduled during a brief hearing Tuesday. 

Vasquez, who has pleaded not guilty to the charge, told police Herzberg “came out of nowhere” and that she didn’t see her prior to the collision. 

Authorities say Vasquez was streaming the television show “The Voice” on a phone and looking downward in the moments before Uber’s Volvo XC-90 SUV collided with Herzberg. But Vasquez’s attorneys said their client was looking at a messaging activity used by Uber employees on a work cellphone that sat on her right knee. “The Voice” was playing on Vasquez’s personal cellphone, which was sitting on the passenger seat, they said.