A Castro Valley resident was indicted Thursday on charges that he slashed the tires of 17 Waymo robotaxis in San Francisco between June 24 and June 26, according to the city's district attorney.
Prosecutors said the slashed tire was captured on a camera mounted outside a Waymo robotaxi, the latest in a string of Waymo vandalism incidents in the Bay Area where some residents have voiced concerns about autonomous vehicles.
San Francisco has a wider history of robotaxi backlash. In February, a crowd in the city’s Chinatown neighborhood set fire to a Waymo, again causing robotaxi vandalism. About a year ago, other robotaxi haters placed traffic cones on top of self-driving cars, a hack that disabled the vehicles.
This time, Waymo’s technology appears to have captured one of these alleged crimes on video. In an email to TechCrunch, Waymo said San Francisco police reviewed footage from the vehicle’s exterior cameras to identify the suspect.
“We can confirm that charges have been filed against individuals who have aggressively damaged several Waymo vehicles, some of which had riders present,” Waymo spokeswoman Catherine Barna said in an email. “Waymo is also taking steps to repair the damages sustained and mitigate the potential for future incidents.”
Prosecutors allege the tire slashing incident in the city’s Tenderloin neighborhood is connected to another robotaxi slashing incident on city records, in which the same suspect allegedly approached a caravan of three Waymo vehicles around the same time and slashed their tires.
“I would like to thank the San Francisco Police Department for their careful investigation into this incident,” he said. “Destroying someone else’s property is not something we can get away with in San Francisco,” San Francisco District Attorney Brooks Jenkins said in a news release. “People who destroy property must be held accountable for their actions.”
The suspect has pleaded not guilty to 17 charges. The damage to each vehicle is estimated at more than $400. Prosecutors are holding the suspect without bail while awaiting trial, citing “public safety risks.” Their court date is set for Friday, July 12.
Waymo says it carefully reviews all requests from law enforcement before providing vehicle footage. The company says it challenges, limits or rejects requests that lack a valid legal basis or are overly broad, and has done so in the past.
The San Francisco District Attorney's Office declined to comment further.
The article originally misstated the suspects' residence. They live in Castro Valley.
