A Waymo robotaxi in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Beverly Grove was targeted by a crowd of vandals over the weekend, video posted to social media shows.
The incident unfolded at around 4 a.m. at the intersection of La Cienega Boulevard and West 3rd Street, with the Los Angeles Police Department telling the L.A. Times that responding officers took a vandalism report but that no arrests were made.
The driverless taxi, which did not have a customer inside at the time, was reportedly stopped at a red light when the crowd surrounded the Jaguar and began vandalizing it.
In footage of the incident posted online by X account Los Angeles Scanner, one person can be seen on the roof of the vehicle while another person was in the “driver’s” seat. A third person was seen kicking the back passenger door.
The passenger front door had been ripped off and was lying on the hood of the vehicle and at least the passenger side front tire had been flattened. All the windows, including the windshield were shattered as well.
Julia Ilina, a spokesperson for Waymo told The Times in a statement that the company was working with police on the investigation and added that “these types of events are rare.”
Another post on X by the same account suggested some 40 people had taken part in the vandalism during a street takeover, though police told The Times they had no evidence that there had been a takeover in the area.
Earlier this month in the Fairfax District, a robbery suspect who got into an altercation with a security guard at a grocery store attempted to flee in one of the self-driving taxis, making it about three miles from the store before the car pulled over for police, video obtained by KTLA showed.
