New details have emerged about the January SoMa crash that killed Mikhael Romanenko and his dog, injured seven others, and was perpetrated by a driver who may have at least 20 prior traffic violations—who now claims the Tesla accelerated on its own.

As reported by SFist, the crash occurred on the evening of January 19, when a black Tesla Model Y exited Interstate 280 at Sixth Street, sideswiping three vehicles and accelerating as it raced through red lights at nearly 90 miles per hour. At the intersection of Sixth and Harrison, the Tesla plowed into a Lexus that was stopped at a red light.

The force of the impact caused a chain reaction that damaged seven vehicles and killed 27-year-old Mikhael “Misha” Romanenko and the couple’s 8-year-old miniature Golden Doodle, Keeper, as reported by KGO. Romanenko’s girlfriend, 26-year-old Linh Luu, who had been riding in the passenger seat, was critically injured, suffering from a concussion, broken bones, and undergoing two surgeries.

The Tesla’s driver, 66-year-old Jia Lin Zheng, was arrested at the scene on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter, reckless driving causing injury, felony vandalism, and speeding. Investigators found no signs that Zheng was impaired, and no evidence of any recent medical episodes. Despite the severity of the crash, Zheng was released pending further investigation and later allowed to return to his home in Hawaii.

According to Bay City New, a black Tesla matching the description of Zheng’s vehicle had reportedly been involved in multiple collisions shortly before the fatal crash. Hawaii News Now also found that a person with the same name and spelling as Zheng has had nearly 20 traffic-related infractions over the past two decades, including multiple violations for excessive speeding and running red lights.

Although the San Francisco District Attorney’s office has not confirmed whether these violations belong to the same person, Linh Luu believes they do. “This is somebody who has had a trail of traffic violations, has shown clear disregard for the law, and most importantly, human life,” she told Hawaii News Now.

Romanenko’s family has since filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Zheng as well as his son and daughter-in-law, alleging they knowingly allowed a reckless driver to operate a high-powered vehicle, which was owned by Zheng’s son.

Prosecutors have not yet filed formal charges, citing the complexity of the investigation. San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins said the vehicle must undergo a detailed inspection, which is usually performed by the manufacturer, as well as black box data retrieval and full accident reconstruction.

As reported by the Chronicle yesterday, Zheng told police the car accelerated on its own and that pressing the brake caused it to speed up after exiting the freeway.

The company has a growing list of complaints involving sudden unintended acceleration (SUA), which it has long maintained were due to user error, often pedal misapplication, as reported by Teslarati. In 2021, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reviewed 246 such complaints and found no design flaws, according to TechCrunch. Tesla’s internal data typically shows that drivers were fully pressing the accelerator at the time of crashes.

In a recent Reddit thread on the topic, a user referenced a study in National Library of Medicine demonstrating that older study participants showed a significant decline in their ability to correct their behavior when unintentionally stepping on the wrong pedal.

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“We investigate every single incident where the driver alleges to us that their vehicle accelerated contrary to their input, and in every case where we had the vehicle’s data, we confirmed that the car operated as designed,” the company said in a 2020 press release in response to the recall petition that led to NHTSA’s investigation. “In other words, the car accelerates if, and only if, the driver told it to do so, and it slows or stops when the driver applies the brake.”

Yet SUA complaints against Tesla persist. Since the 2021 review, over 270 additional SUA claims involving Tesla vehicles have been filed. Many describe sudden acceleration in parking lots, garages, or on highways—some while driver-assistance features like Autopilot were engaged. In multiple cases, drivers insist they did not press the accelerator.

A second recall petition was submitted in 2023 with updated claims about design flaws leading to SUA. NHTSA has yet to make a decision, according to AutoEvolution. InsideEVs has technical info from Tesla “hackers” who dismissed the claims in the petition.  

In April, Tesla issued its first known SUA-related wrongful death settlement to the family of Clyde Leach, who was killed in 2021 after his Tesla crashed and caught fire near Dayton, Ohio, as reported by Reuters.

As lawsuits over sudden acceleration pile up, the settlement in April suggests the company may be quietly shifting away from its usual strategy of denying fault and blaming drivers. AutoEvolution goes further to allege that the company has quietly been fixing reported flaws via software updates without any transparency.

The outcome of the San Francisco case could help set a precedent for SUA cases. For Linh Luu, however, no outcome will restore what she lost.

“I don’t think anything he’s able to tell me is going to bring the closure that I need,” she told Hawaii News Now.

Image: Benespit/Wikimedia

Previously: One Killed, Seven Injured In Multi-Vehicle SoMa Crash; Tesla Driver Detained, Linked Also to Freeway Crash