Tesla convictions on the rise in traffic cases

ELON Musk’s Tesla car company has been convicted at least 18 times and ordered to pay more than £20,000 for repeatedly failing to cooperate with UK police forces.

- TRISTAN KIRK

The British arm of the American electric car firm has faced multiple criminal court proceedings over the past two years linked to allegations of road traffic offences.

In each case, when British police officers tried to track down the details of speeding Tesla drivers, their letters went unanswered and the forces ended up prosecuting the company itself.

The latest conviction, which ended in a £1,000 fine plus an order for £120 costs and a £400 victim surcharge, was handed out at Merthyr Tydfil Magistrates’ Court on January 6 this year.

South Wales Police wrote to Tesla Financial Services at its offices in Manchester, in a bid to identify the driver of a Tesla which had been speeding at 80mph on the M4 near to the village of Groes-faen, in Rhondda Cynon Taf, on July 4 last year.