{"id":248827,"date":"2026-04-27T22:29:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T22:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/248827\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T22:29:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T22:29:12","slug":"drunk-driver-found-asleep-in-tesla-using-autopilot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/248827\/","title":{"rendered":"Drunk driver found asleep in Tesla using autopilot"},"content":{"rendered":"

A drunk Florida woman was found asleep in her Tesla on a highway after trying to get it to drive her home on autopilot, according to police.<\/p>\n

Kimberly Brown, 37, was found passed out behind the wheel of her electric car around 2 a.m. Friday when the autopilot detected her eyes had been closed for too long, leaving it in the middle lane of Interstate 75 in Sarasota, police said.<\/p>\n

She was charged with DUI, ABC4 reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was extremely dangerous,\u201d Florida Highway Patrol trooper Kenn Watson told WWSB<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe should not have been behind the wheel,\u201d he said. \u201cUnfortunately, she was intoxicated more than two times the legal limit and made the assumption that the Tesla would get her home safely.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BrownBrown was charged with driving under the influence. Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office<\/p>\n

Police said the Tesla\u2019s eye detection feature \u2014 which switches off when anyone using autopilot has their eyes closed for too long \u2014 was to thank for stopping her dangerous ride.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re actually monitors within the vehicle that make sure that you\u2019re looking forward and will initially warn you,\u201d said Alistair Weaver, editor-in-chief of the auto publication Edmunds.com.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe car came to a stop after the Tesla\u2019s eye detectors showed Brown was asleep. Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then ultimately shut down the car and shut down the system if you\u2019re not paying attention.\u201d<\/p>\n

The incident remains under investigation, according to police.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A drunk Florida woman was found asleep in her Tesla on a highway after trying to get it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248828,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[265,35798,5695,28,30,29,3395,4278],"class_list":["post-248827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-crime","tag-drunk-driving","tag-dui","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-tesla","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248827\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248828"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}