The family of Carlos Venegas, a 35-year-old San Benito resident, sued the commercial space company and affiliate DogLeg Park LLC for negligence last March.
The family was on a camping trip at Boca Chica Beach, near Brownsville, on June 7, 2020, off the highway near the SpaceX spaceport, according to the complaint.
The family left the campgrounds at 4 a.m. as the tide began to rise. On the highway, Venegas crashed into an 18-wheeler commercial truck attempting to turn onto SpaceX's one-lane access road to make a delivery, the complaint said. The truck was idling and partially blocking the darkened highway.
"Without any reflective signage, lighting of any kind, warning markers, reflective markers, stop lights, stop signs, cones, security personnel or safety systems, the Venegas family could not see the truck at all," the complaint said.
Venegas died of head trauma at the scene of the crash, while his wife and children suffered spinal and leg injuries.
Venegas' "death could have been avoided" had the space company taken safety measures to protect drivers near the facility, the complaint alleged.
SpaceX's attorneys, David George Oliveira and Rene Oliveira Jr. of McAllen, said the company wasn't responsible for his death because the accident did not occur on its property and didn't involve company employees.
In Brownsville, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez, Jr. dismissed the lawsuit last week.
Rodriguez agreed with the recommendations of U.S. Magistrate Judge Ronald G. Morgan, who said in November that the case should be dismissed because of legal precedents that protect property owners from liability claims that result from accidents on nearby roads.
"A landowner's duty to exercise reasonable care not to endanger the safety of persons on an abutting highway does not create an obligation to guard passing motorists against the possible negligence of an independent contractor over whom the landowner exercises no control and whose competence to perform his duties the landowner has no reason to doubt," Morgan said in his recommendation.
Anthony Buzbee, the Venegas family's Houston-based lawyer, did not respond to a request for comment.
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