SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Tesla whistleblower's lawyer: My client may have been effectively swatted
A lawyer representing Martin Tripp has released a 10-page police report that he says raises new questions concerning a purported June 20 shooting threat to the Tesla Gigafactory near Reno, Nevada, where the technician worked until he was fired on June 15. The document was first reported by Bloomberg. A month ago, Tesla sued Tripp for alleged trade secrets violations, and he has recently countersued, claiming that he has been defamed.
The report shows that a call expressing vague concern over what Tripp apparently might do was somehow translated to law enforcement as a direct violent attack against the Nevada facility.
"How did it go from the call center to a very serious terrorist threat?" Stuart Meissner, one of Tripp's attorneys, told Ars late Wednesday evening. "I think that's a question that Tesla is going to have to answer in this litigation," Will Fischbach, another one of Tripp's lawyers, told Ars. Meissner, who obtained the report from the Storey County Sheriff's Office under a state public records request, wrote on Twitter on Wednesday that Tripp may have even been set up.
I present the "GigaGate" Police Reports Re the Tesla Giga Factory Terrorist Threat Incident & what may turn out to B the "SWATing" of our client.
We have asked to reopen the investigation as to the source of the reported "threat." Judge for yourself https://t.co/SYKpcQfjcl
Previously: Musk Alleges Tesla Model 3 Production Has Been Sabotaged, According To CNBC
Tesla Sues Former Employee it Accuses of Sabotage
(Score: 3, Funny) by FatPhil on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:27PM (5 children)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:49PM (4 children)
No no no... This is one sues the other, the other sends a SWAT team to his home in hopes he'd be shot dead.
I think we're living through 80s and 90s dystopian scify action films. Only, there's no cool tech or drugs so there's nothing *opian about it.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:55PM (1 child)
What, VR and spice [wikipedia.org] aren't good enough for you?
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by sjames on Friday August 03 2018, @12:11AM
If it was this [wikipedia.org] spice, it might be OK.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:57PM (1 child)
What else would you expect from Mask the Pedophile... https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/nation-now/2018/07/15/elon-musk-thai-cave-rescue-diver-pedophile-twitter/786527002/ [usatoday.com]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:59PM
Older white man takes a job in Thailand. A job that allows him to grope wet women and children.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:55PM (2 children)
A dumb one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @11:57PM (1 child)
Why?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 03 2018, @12:09AM
By association with Trump.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Knowledge Troll on Friday August 03 2018, @08:08AM (11 children)
I don't find coordinated sabotage by the existing oil and car industry to be very likely as the root cause of the problems at Tesla as Musk wants everyone to think. I just don't see Tesla as nearly any kind of threat to the car companies because they can easily wait for it to either rot from the inside and collapse or if it becomes an actual threat just out produce it and out compete it to a brutal degree because Musk is a nub in this space.
I don't know what is going on inside that company but I think something is rotten, the cracks are starting to show, and distracting from that is becoming more and more difficult requiring weirder and weirder things to happen. Either that or Musk is having some kind of mental issues. Or both and who knows which one is the leading edge.
The story makes some pretty conclusive claims that seem like they could be falsified such as the non-existent threat is escalating. It sounds really suspicious but it also sounds like something that would happen when people play telephone inside an organization and does not have had to been intentional.
My gut says the guy was a jerk on the job and saw something he didn't think was right and was unable to find what he considered to be an appropriate way to get the problem recognized and addressed and didn't let it go. A history of being a jerk led to overreaction inside Tesla as a rumor spread.
I have to give Tesla the benefit of the doubt for that to work out but I'm not ready to convict them on this yet. I really dislike Tesla for many reasons but I don't think they would do this. They'll kill their drivers with bleeding edge technology unfit for the use case and with unreasonable requirements of supervision leading to blame the victim mentality in the population but I don't think they would SWAT someone.
(Score: 3, Informative) by G-forze on Friday August 03 2018, @09:51AM (3 children)
Not necessarily the oil and/or car industry, but short sellers willing to do anything not to lose their huge bet on Tesla failing.
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/elon-musk-vs-short-sellers.118431/ [teslamotorsclub.com]
If I run into the term "SJW", I stop reading.
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Friday August 03 2018, @02:55PM
Thanks this is such an interesting read.
Dafuq - that doesn't seem right.
I'm still chewing through this but there are some really compelling arguments in here for short sellers trying to murder Tesla.
Thank you for the link.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday August 03 2018, @06:09PM
Not necessarily the oil and/or car industry, but short sellers willing to do anything not to lose their huge bet on Tesla failing.
When the last problems at Tesla story came out I did a pretty deep dive into the allegations. While I was digging around I found some pretty compelling evidence that the auto union down there is also making some noise about Tesla in a bid to represent that plant.
That's not necessarily a bad thing. But, they are an additional motivated and vocal party to this whole mess that you do need to take with a grain of salt sometimes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 03 2018, @07:22PM
I have no position on TSLA. But why don't they fund long-term projects with long-term debt, instead of convertible bonds that they have to constantly roll over? Jeez. First they play a confidence game and then they complain when pros move in who try to tear them down.
(Score: 2) by DavePolaschek on Friday August 03 2018, @02:46PM (3 children)
Is it time for Elon to buy his compound in Belize before the assassins start making attempts on his life?
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Friday August 03 2018, @05:04PM (2 children)
Are you thinking he should go for a passive or active strategy for dealing with the threats?
I wonder if McCaffee wrote a book or even a howto on solving problems with people you don't like in Belize.
(Score: 2) by DavePolaschek on Saturday August 04 2018, @11:30PM (1 child)
Can’t decide, but it’d be a real hoot if he tried to out-weird McAfee.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Knowledge Troll on Sunday August 05 2018, @02:55AM
The biggest lesson I got from the McCafffee documentary I saw is: if a documentarian contacts you and you respond by saying she will never interview you, she is dumb and you are smarter than her and she'll never win then she'll just pay your ex-gfs to say that you never wanted to ever have sex with them instead you just wanted them to shit in your mouth through a hole in a hammock.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Friday August 03 2018, @06:55PM (2 children)
>I don't know what is going on inside that company but I think something is rotten, the cracks are starting to show, and distracting from that is becoming more and more difficult requiring weirder and weirder things to happen.
Doesn't Tesla use some kind of stack ranking system and fire their "low performing" employees? That right there is all you need to fuck up a company.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Friday August 03 2018, @08:17PM (1 child)
I'm not really familiar with what you are talking about. Is that something like there is a constant churn of N% so only the cream of the crop stays?
Yeah I mean that wouldn't destroy morale or anything.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday August 04 2018, @11:05PM
Stack ranking is where employees rank each other in terms of performance, and generally the lowest N get some kind of special treatment (such as fired). The best part is that performance becomes secondary. Performing well risks all of your coworkers turning on you and ranking you last. Politics becomes the primary concern.
I recall reading that Tesla had something like that, but I can't find it now.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!