BELLBROOK — His Tesla Cybertruck now damaged and in need of nearly $10,000 in repairs, a Bellbrook man nevertheless told police he doesn’t want to pursue charges against the woman arrested on suspicion of vandalizing the silver vehicle that was parked in his driveway.
>> JD Vance accepts RNC’s nomination as Trump’s running mate
“Its just a really bizarre situation,” Daniel Herres said Wednesday. “You just never think something like that is going to happen until it actually does.”
Here’s what Herres said happened Monday afternoon to the brand new 2024 vehicle he was using to operate his ice cream business, Cyber Cream Dayton:
He was home when he heard what sounded like glass being smashed. His Ring video cam captured the sound of someone smashing the windows on the vehicle, which Tesla says has shatter-resistant glass and retails for anywhere from $116,990 used to $146,800 new, according to a quick scan of auto dealers such as Autotrader and CarGurus,com in Dayton.
The woman had pulled into the driveway, gotten out and began smashing the vehicle’s windows. When she was finished, she got into her car, backed out of the driveway and drove away.
She had smashed all but one of the windows, police said.
“There were two kids in the backseat and they were both crying you know. They just witnessed something really bizarre and strange happen,” Herres said.
>> Vandalism in Springfield forces businesses to close
Sugarcreek Twp. police, who found and arrested the woman minutes later in the area of the Cracker Barrel access road at Wilmington Pike and Feedwire Road, identified her as 29-year-old Courtney Piotrowski of Richmond, Indiana.
Police said that before the arrest, Piotrowski went to a neighbor’s home on the same street Herres lives on and knocked over two propane tanks on that property. The neighbor told police Piotrowski screamed at him before speeding away.
Bellbrook police gave her a citation to court on a misdemeanor criminal damaging charge.
Meantime, Piotrowski is due in Xenia Municipal Court on July 29 on charges Sugarcreek Twp. police said involve her. Officers, in a supplemental police incident report about the vandalism involving Herres, said she and her vehicle “are related to a recent criminal damaging report from Ferry Road in Sugarcreek Twp. and multiple traffic complaints in the city and township.”
Herres said the damage to his cybertruck will force him to shut down the ice cream truck business for the rest of the summer. He said he started the business in May.
“Within 30 seconds, our business was torpedoed,” he said.
Herres said he had never seen the woman before Monday.
“I feel really sorry for the children, and we just really wish the best for everyone, we want everyone to come out OK with this,” he said.