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A Sydney court last week sentenced Enrico Pucci, 50, to two years and three months in prison after convicting him of 30 domestic violence-related charges — including one count of coercive control under New South Wales' landmark 2024 law — for a campaign in which he used Tesla's remotely operated parental controls to cap his former partner's speed at 40 kilometers per hour (25 mph) on main roads, cycle her cabin temperature between extremes, and make seven attempts to cut off her car's charging.

The case — widely believed to be among Australia's first criminal convictions in which the remote abuse of a connected-car platform formed the basis of a telecommunications charge — turns on an architectural feature Tesla designed for parents of teen drivers: a PIN-protected account profile that grants the primary account holder total remote authority over a vehicle's speed, temperature, charging access, and movement schedules, with no mechanism for the person sitting in the car to override or remove it.

Australia's online safety regulator, the eSafety Commission, had warned explicitly about this dynamic nine months before the Pucci conviction. In a formal advisory published on December 1, 2025, Commissioner Julie Inman Grant described how abusers were exploiting connected vehicle features to surveil, track, and control victims. Her office had received 400 calls for help and 20,000 requests for information about smart-car abuse in the preceding year, according to the eSafety Commission advisory.

How a Teen-Safety Feature Became a Control Weapon

Tesla's parental controls system was released in software update 2024.26 in mid-2024 as a family safety tool. Accessed through the Tesla smartphone app, it allows the primary account holder to set speed caps, enforce low-acceleration Chill Mode, and receive night-driving alerts — all through the Tesla parental controls system — and restrict curfew hours — times outside which the car will not start. A separate "Valet Mode" cap, available at 40 km/h (25 mph), is secured behind a PIN known only to the primary account holder and cannot be modified or removed by anyone else.

The victim in the Pucci case — identified by the pseudonym "Stacey" in court documents to protect her safety — had bought the Tesla while the pair were still together. When she struggled with its technology, Pucci volunteered to help but told her the car would need to be registered in his name for him to manage the app. She agreed, according to court documents examined by The Guardian, wanting only assistance with the vehicle. When the relationship ended, that account access did not.

On November 1, 2025, Stacey noticed that the vehicle's electronic dashboard had been reset and an unfamiliar "parental control" profile had appeared. Three days later, Pucci confirmed — shouting at her from a following vehicle — exactly what had happened. "You thought you'd get away with this," he told her. "I am in your car. I am in your maps."

Between November 6 and 12, 2025, court documents state, Pucci used the Tesla app to cycle the cabin between extreme cold and extreme heat, imposed Valet Mode — reducing her top speed to 40 km/h (25 mph) — while she was driving on arterial roads, and made seven attempts to remotely disconnect the charging port. Stacey had no access to the profile Pucci had created. The court heard the restrictions had caused serious road safety problems for the victim.

What Account-Holder Supremacy Means — and Why It Matters

The architectural feature at the heart of this case is not a bug. It is a deliberate design decision: in Tesla's account model, the registered primary account holder holds remote command over the vehicle regardless of who is physically inside it, physically dependent on it, or legally entitled to use it.

Domestic violence advocates have been naming this vulnerability for years. Adam Dodge, the chief executive of Ending Tech-Enabled Abuse, a US non-profit, has called connected car stalking a "blind spot" for victims and automakers, noting that most victims he has spoken to are "wholly unaware that the car they rely on is app-connected in the first place."

The problem is compounded by the specific economics of relationship breakdown. During a relationship, it is common for one partner to set up and manage technology accounts — including vehicle apps — on behalf of both. When the relationship ends, those accounts rarely transfer automatically. Abusers retain remote capability indefinitely unless they choose to give it up or are legally compelled to do so. In Pucci's case, no law required either.

"They are essentially computers on wheels," Grant told reporters in Canberra, "and we don't want them to become weapons on wheels." Grant called on manufacturers to build in stronger protections: emergency account-separation mechanisms, visible audit logs showing who is accessing the vehicle remotely, and better factory resets when vehicles change hands. None of those recommendations are legally binding in Australia. None have been implemented by Tesla.

What Does the Law Say? An Australian and Global Gap

The Pucci conviction is not only significant for what it proves about connected vehicle technology. It is also one of the first prosecutions under New South Wales' landmark coercive control law — the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Coercive Control) Act 2022 — which took effect on July 1, 2024, as Section 54D of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW). The charge of coercive control — a pattern of abusive behavior designed to subjugate a partner — was applied directly to Pucci's cumulative conduct, which the presiding magistrate described as a campaign of sustained and deliberate control intended to "entrench power and compliance."

NSW was the first Australian state to criminalize coercive control as a standalone offense. Queensland followed with its own legislation in 2024, set to take effect in 2025. Victoria, as of the date of the Pucci conviction, had no standalone coercive control offense. The NSW law carries a maximum penalty of seven years' imprisonment. According to a NSW crime statistics monitoring report, 297 victims of coercive control were recorded in NSW in the first year the law was in force, with 94 percent of those victims female.

On the specific question of connected vehicle protections, however, Australia has no equivalent to what California enacted when Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1394 into law on September 27, 2024. That law — the first connected-vehicle protection law in the United States — requires any vehicle manufacturer to terminate a person's access to "connected vehicle services" within two business days of receiving a documented request from a driver presenting proof of legal vehicle possession or a domestic violence restraining order. Manufacturers are barred from demanding additional information or charging a fee.

The two-business-day account separation requirement is now in force. A separate provision requiring vehicles to include an in-vehicle mechanism to disable location access was originally due July 1, 2026, but automakers successfully argued the deadline was technically unworkable. On June 29, 2026, California's legislature passed Senate Bill 719 unanimously (67-0 in the Assembly, 33-0 in the Senate), extending that in-vehicle disable requirement to 2027 and mandating full compliance for all new vehicles by the 2031 model year. The core access-separation protection remained intact throughout that legislative process.

New York has enacted its own connected-vehicle domestic violence protection legislation. Vermont and other states had introduced similar bills as of early 2025. Then-FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel wrote in January 2024 to nine major automakers including Tesla — requesting details on their policies for protecting domestic violence survivors from account-based tracking, citing a New York Times investigation that had documented multiple cases of vehicle apps being weaponized in abusive relationships.

Australia has no comparable national legislation. The eSafety Commissioner's December 2025 advisory carried no legal compulsion. In May 2026, NSW Premier Chris Minns announced amendments that would criminalize covert stalking through tracking devices and related surveillance conduct — but those proposals address law enforcement against abusers, not the architectural obligation on manufacturers to enable account separation.

Tesla's History With This Problem

The Pucci case is not the first time Tesla has appeared in court documents alongside accounts of a connected vehicle being used to harass a domestic violence survivor. A case in San Francisco — in which a woman alleged her estranged husband used their shared Tesla Model X account to open and lock doors, change suspension settings, and disable charging — led to a civil lawsuit that ultimately failed. A court sided with Tesla after the company argued the woman had presented no proof beyond her belief and imagination that her husband had used the technology against her. Tesla told the court it could not locate letters from domestic violence advocates that the woman said she had submitted, asking the company to preserve access logs and terminate her husband's account. Tesla required that his name be removed from the vehicle title before it would disable his account.

General Motors' OnStar service allows all drivers — including non-primary account holders — to mask their vehicle's location. Rivian said at the time of California's legislative debate that it was developing a similar function and believed "users should have a right to control where that information goes." Tesla's approach has remained centered on the primary account holder.

Pucci's Background: A Pattern of Exploitation

The court heard that Pucci's abuse of Stacey over four years was not limited to the Tesla. Documents described him as having used what the magistrate called "multiple methods of domination," including manufacturing financial dependence — in a separate matter involving another woman, he forged an employment contract offering a salary of approximately AUD $250,000 (approximately $156,000 USD) and solicited a loan of AUD $100,000 (approximately $63,000 USD) in life savings, which he did not repay.

In 2017, a federal court found that Pucci's Sydney cleaning business had subjected vulnerable migrant workers to exploitation, withholding pay for months and denying workers basic necessities. The Fair Work Ombudsman secured a penalty of nearly AUD $450,000 (approximately $281,000 USD) against his company. His brother Rosario Pucci, former owner-operator, was fined a further AUD $74,300 (approximately $46,000 USD). In 2022, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission barred Pucci from managing corporations for the maximum period of five years following the insolvency of three businesses that together owed nearly AUD $10,000,000 (approximately $6,252,000 USD) to creditors.

Does Anyone Check Who Controls Your Car?

The Pucci conviction carries implications that extend well beyond the individual case. In Australia, roughly 90 percent of all new cars sold are projected to include built-in telematics by 2031, according to the eSafety Commission's December 2025 advisory. Every one of those vehicles will be capable of being remotely monitored, unlocked, or controlled by whoever holds the primary account — which is often established at the point of purchase, frequently by a salesperson assisting a couple, and rarely reviewed when relationships change.

Sue Webeck, chief executive of Domestic Violence Crisis Support, described the pattern as "insidious," noting it dramatically alters a survivor's experience of safety even after they have physically relocated away from an abusive partner. A survivor who has moved to a new address and obtained a restraining order may still find, the next morning, that their car cannot be started — or cannot be driven faster than 25 mph.

What happened to Stacey in November 2025 — the car alarm that sounded three times in the night, the reset dashboard, the profile she could not remove — did not require technical expertise to execute. It required only a smartphone, an app, and an architecture that had placed total control in the hands of whoever registered the account, with no consideration for what happens when the person who registered it should never have that control again.

Tesla has not publicly addressed whether it has implemented any safeguard since the Pucci conviction to prevent the use of parental controls profiles as an instrument of intimate partner abuse.

Pucci has lodged an appeal against all 30 convictions and will return to court in late October 2026.

Currency conversions are based on the AUD/USD exchange rate as of September 10, 2026 (approximately 1 AUD = 0.6252 USD) and are approximate.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can someone else control my Tesla remotely without my knowledge?

Yes, if they hold primary account access. Tesla's parental controls system, introduced in mid-2024, is designed for parents of teen drivers but grants the primary account holder remote authority over a vehicle's speed, temperature, charging access, and movement schedules. Because settings are secured behind a PIN known only to the primary account holder, anyone else driving the car — including the legal owner — cannot modify or remove those restrictions without the primary account holder's cooperation. If you share or have previously shared a Tesla with a partner, check Settings > Safety > Parental Controls to confirm no unfamiliar profile exists, and contact Tesla to confirm who holds primary account status on your vehicle.

How do I remove an abusive ex-partner's remote access to my car?

In California, Senate Bill 1394 (signed September 27, 2024) requires Tesla and other manufacturers to terminate an abusive partner's access to connected vehicle services within two business days when you present proof of legal vehicle possession or a domestic violence restraining order — at no charge and with no additional documentation required. In Australia, no equivalent national law exists. Contact Tesla's customer support and, if possible, also contact your local domestic violence service for safety planning before making any changes that could alert the person with account access. In Australia, 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732) can provide guidance on technology safety.

What is coercive control and how does the Pucci case relate to it?

Coercive control is a pattern of abusive behaviors — including surveillance, economic manipulation, isolation, and restriction of movement — designed to make a partner dependent and afraid. The concept was formulated by sociologist Evan Stark and is now criminalized under New South Wales' Crimes Legislation Amendment (Coercive Control) Act 2022, which took effect July 1, 2024, as Section 54D of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW). The Pucci conviction is among the first in NSW to include a standalone coercive control charge applied to a case where technology — specifically a vehicle app — was a primary instrument of the controlling conduct. NSW domestic violence data found that 97 percent of intimate partner homicides between 2000 and 2018 were preceded by emotional or psychological abuse consistent with coercive control patterns.

Does Australia have any law protecting domestic violence survivors from connected-vehicle tracking?

No national law does. The eSafety Commission's December 2025 advisory called on manufacturers to implement emergency account-separation mechanisms, audit logs, and factory resets at ownership transfer — but the advisory carries no legal force. NSW Premier Chris Minns announced in May 2026 that his government would introduce amendments to criminalize covert surveillance via tracking devices; those reforms target abusers' criminal liability rather than the manufacturers' structural obligation to enable account separation. California's Senate Bill 1394 — the only law of its kind in the world — requires a two-business-day account separation on documented request. Australia has not yet legislated an equivalent.

If you or someone you know is affected by domestic or family violence, support is available. In Australia, contact 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732). In the United States, the National Domestic Violence Hotline can be reached at 1-800-799-7233.