San Francisco arson suspect who targeted 2 Teslas last weekend arrested
Police in San Francisco on Thursday confirmed they have arrested the arson suspect who set two Teslas on fire last weekend in the city's South of Market neighborhood.
The fires happened early Saturday morning. Surveillance video caught the person in action in one of the incidents. The first fire happened at around 12:45 a.m. near the intersection of Shipley and 4th Streets.
In the video, the man can be seen putting papers on top of the tire of a parked Tesla Model Y before he lights the papers on fire. Minutes later, the car is engulfed in flames.
Another Tesla was torched near the intersection of Bonifacio and Mabini Streets just a block away from where the first car was burned within a 30-minute timespan.
Van Vuong, the visitor who owned the first Tesla that was targeted, walked by the remains of his own car before he realized what happened.
"We were going to go get in the car to go play some tennis. First thing I noticed was that, 'Hey, someone burned a car.' And we just kind of walked by it and I thought 'Shoot, where's my car?' And I thought 'No, that can't be my car.' And then I kind of looked around at the parts that were here, the license plate was here. And it was white color. And I was like, 'Oh my God, my car is gone!'" recalled Vuong.
The heat melted the back of a red Hyundai sedan parked in front of the Tesla and charred a nearby tree.
Vuong drove his Tesla from Seattle to visit his two sons. They're studying at a San Francisco dental school. He'll rent a car to drive back to Seattle.
"I hear [San Francisco is] beautiful and it's ugly. And we've got hit by the ugly," said Vuong.