Tesla vandal turns himself in after seeing Sentry Mode video online

Another Tesla vandal has turned himself in after a Sentry Mode video of the act of vandalism went viral online.

He said that it was ‘stupid’ and he has nothing against Tesla.

Tesla’s Sentry Mode, which is an integrated surveillance system inside Tesla’s vehicles using the Autopilot cameras around the car, has been changing the game when it comes to vandalizing parked cars.

Earlier this week, we reported on two instances of Tesla Sentry mode catching people key Model 3 cars in Canada.

One of those happened to Model 3 owner Godwin Leung in Edmonton.

Sentry mode caught a man in sunglasses getting out of a pickup truck, walking up to his car, and keying the side before going back in his truck and leaving:

As we reported at the time, the license plate is unfortunately not visible in the Tesla Sentry Mode video, but it does show the vandal’s face somewhat clearly despite him wearing sunglasses.

We said that the owner would have to rely on the public to find the man and after we posted the video, it received over 50,000 hits.

Now the police report that Austin Grabas, 20 years-old, has come forward and turned himself in after seeing the video online.

He has been charged with one count of mischief over the act of vandalism.

The 20-year-old said that he was frustrated after a car cut him off and he thought the Model 3 might have been the same car (via Global News):

“I wasn’t thinking. I made a stupid mistake,”

The Edmonton man said that he saw the video online and “became overcome with disappointment and embarrassment.”

He added that he doesn’t have anything against Tesla and he regretted doing it right away.

Tesla Sentry Mode was first developed to address a growing problem with break-ins that Tesla owners were dealing with, especially in California, but it is now proving useful in other situations.

Several Tesla owners have captured instances of vandalism on their cars with the feature.

Earlier this month, we reported on the case of Alan Tweedie’s Tesla Model 3 being keyed badly by a woman for seemingly no reason while he was at his daughter’s soccer game.

The Tesla Sentry mode video of her keying the car went viral and she ended up turning herself in.

There was also another similar incident involving two men who ended up turning themselves in earlier this year and now this new incident in Canada becomes the third example of vandals turning themselves in because of Sentry mode.

While Tesla Sentry Mode is useful to capture those incidents and pressure the vandals, the hope is that the feature gets publicized enough that people become less inclined to vandalize Tesla vehicles in the first place.

In order for Sentry Mode to work on a Tesla, you need a few accessories. We recommend Jeda’s Model 3 USB hub to be able to still use the other plugs and hide your Sentry Mode drive. For the drive, I’m now using a Samsung portable SSD, which you need to format, but it gives you a ton of capacity, and it can be easily hidden in the Jeda hub.