Your Car’s Black Box Is a Witness: Event Data Recorders in Florida Criminal Cases

Investigators just pulled the data out of Tiger Woods’s wrecked SUV. Your car keeps the same records — and in a Florida criminal case, those records can testify against you.

On February 23, Tiger Woods crashed his SUV on a curving stretch of road in Los Angeles County. He survived. This week, traffic investigators executed a search warrant — not for his blood, and not for his phone, but for his vehicle’s “black box.” You have probably heard of an airplane’s black box. You may not know that your own car almost certainly has one too. The technical term is an event data recorder, or EDR, and if you are ever in a serious crash on US 27 or SR 60, the data sitting inside your dashboard may become the most important witness in the case.

Read this article and learn what your car’s black box records, when Florida police need a warrant to download it, and why the smartest thing you can do after a serious crash is let the machine do the talking.

What Exactly Does a Car’s Black Box Record?

Federal regulation defines an event data recorder as:

a device or function in a vehicle that records the vehicle’s dynamic time-series data during the time period just prior to a crash event (e.g., vehicle speed vs. time) or during a crash event (e.g., delta-V vs. time), intended for retrieval after the crash event.

49 C.F.R. § 563.5. In plain English, the EDR takes a snapshot of the seconds surrounding a crash. The required data elements include the vehicle’s indicated speed, whether the service brake was on or off, how far down the accelerator pedal was pressed, whether the driver’s seatbelt was buckled, and the crash’s “delta-V” — the change in velocity that tells a reconstruction expert how hard the impact was. The recorder does not capture audio or video. It does not need to. Speed, brakes, throttle, and seatbelt are usually the whole ballgame in a crash prosecution.

Does Federal Law Require a Black Box in Your Car?

The governing federal rule is 49 C.F.R. Part 563, which applies to vehicles manufactured on or after September 1, 2012. Note what Part 563 does not say. It does not order manufacturers to install an EDR. The rule applies only to vehicles “if they are equipped with an event data recorder,” and then standardizes the data the device must capture. This is so because manufacturers were already installing the devices on their own — the EDR typically lives in the airbag control module — and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration chose to standardize the practice rather than mandate it. The practical result is the same either way. Forbes put it plainly back in 2019: “almost all common US vehicles come standard with a black box installed.” If your car is newer than about a decade old, assume it is recording every time you drive.

How Does Black Box Data Show Up in Florida Prosecutions?

In a serious-crash prosecution, the State has to prove how you were driving. Three charges come up again and again. First, vehicular homicide. Section 782.071, Florida Statutes, provides:

“Vehicular homicide” is the killing of a human being, or the killing of an unborn child by any injury to the mother, caused by the operation of a motor vehicle by another in a reckless manner likely to cause the death of, or great bodily harm to, another.

Vehicular homicide is a second-degree felony, and it becomes a first-degree felony where the driver knew or should have known the crash occurred and failed to stop, give information, and render aid. Second, DUI manslaughter under section 316.193(3), Florida Statutes — a second-degree felony carrying “a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of 4 years,” with the same first-degree enhancement for leaving the scene. Also, a DUI crash causing serious bodily injury is a third-degree felony under that statute. Third, reckless driving. Section 316.192(1)(a), Florida Statutes, says that “[a]ny person who drives any vehicle in willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property is guilty of reckless driving,” and reckless driving that causes serious bodily injury is itself a third-degree felony.

Now look back at the data elements. Speed. Brake application. Throttle position. Seatbelt use. Every one of them speaks directly to “reckless manner” and “willful or wanton disregard.” This is important because the EDR download is not an officer’s estimate or an eyewitness’s guess — it is machine data, and juries treat it that way. A download showing 90 miles per hour in a 45 zone with no braking in the final seconds can carry a vehicular homicide case largely by itself.

Can Florida Police Download the Data Without a Warrant?

Can law enforcement simply plug into your impounded car and take the data? The answer is “no,” according to State v. Worsham, 227 So. 3d 602 (Fla. 4th DCA 2017). In Worsham, the defendant’s passenger was killed in a high-speed crash. The vehicle was impounded, and twelve days later — without a warrant — law enforcement downloaded the event data recorder. Worsham was charged with DUI manslaughter and vehicular homicide, and he moved to suppress the download. The Fourth District affirmed the suppression, concluding “there is a reasonable expectation of privacy in the information retained by an event data recorder,” and that downloading it from an impounded car without a warrant, absent exigent circumstances, violated the Fourth Amendment.

Note that Florida has no statute governing EDR data. Your protection rests on the Fourth Amendment and Worsham — which is why, in Tiger’s case, investigators went to a judge for a warrant even while saying he is not expected to face charges. That protection has a soft spot: consent. If an officer asks, “Mind if we take a look at your car?” and you agree, you may have just handed the State your black box without any judge ever reviewing the request. You are not required to consent. Do not.

What Does This Look Like on US 27?

Here is the real-life version I see in Polk, Highlands, and Hardee County cases. A driver heads north on US 27 out of Sebring at night. There is a crash near the SR 60 junction and someone in the other car dies. Florida Highway Patrol traffic homicide investigators respond, the car is towed to an impound lot, and weeks later — warrant in hand — they download the EDR. At the scene, the shaken driver told a trooper, “I wasn’t speeding, maybe 60.” The download says 84 miles per hour with no braking until under a second before impact. By the time a charging decision is made at the courthouse in Bartow, that roadside statement is no longer an explanation. It is impeachment. The driver’s own words, measured against his own car, have become the centerpiece of a vehicular homicide prosecution.

What Should You Say After a Serious Crash?

Once retrieved, black box data will either corroborate or contradict your account of what happened. That is the trap. In Tiger’s case, if he was smart and exercised his right to remain silent, there will be nothing for the data to contradict. The same rule applies on SR 60 as it does in Los Angeles. After a serious crash you are hurt, you are scared, and you want to explain. Resist that urge. Provide your license, registration, and insurance as the law requires, then say you want a lawyer before answering questions. This is so because you cannot talk the data down after the fact — you can only add a second witness against yourself. Your own car may prove to be the prosecutor’s star witness. Do not volunteer to be the second one.

Editor’s update (July 2026): In April 2021, the Los Angeles County Sheriff announced that the Woods crash was caused by unsafe speed — the black box showed 84 to 87 miles per hour with no braking before impact — and no charges were filed. Also, the Florida Legislature has still not enacted an event-data-recorder statute: chapter 316, Florida Statutes, contains no EDR section as of the current statutes, so the warrant-or-consent rule in Florida continues to rest on the Fourth Amendment and case law such as Worsham.

Legally reviewed by Tonmiel Rodriguez — last reviewed July 20, 2026.

Tonmiel Rodriguez is a criminal defense attorney in Bartow and is Board Certified in Criminal Trial Law by The Florida Bar. He defends DUI, vehicular homicide, and serious traffic cases across Polk, Highlands, Hardee, Osceola, and Hillsborough Counties. If a crash investigation has turned into a criminal case against you or someone you love, call The Rodriguez Law Office at (863) 774-4556.