There was the case of the unfavorable NY Times review. The Tesla was sensibly designed so that when the car was parked in an extremely cold garage, the batteries were actively heated to protect them from a damaging freeze. That all makes sense, but it wouldn't make sense to someone new to such a car why the battery shows less range when you get to it in the morning.
The reviewer called support, and they guessed it was simply out of calibration or something, maybe because of the temperature, but without getting to the conclusion that the batteries had actually been used all night to keep themselves warm. Under that assumption, driving in circles for a couple minutes might warm up the system, then return accurate range estimates.
Anyway, the reviewer went on to try to continue his driving trip, the readings never returned to what he thought they should be, and he drove without heat to try to maximize the range. He then wrote a review based on his experience, and without the knowledge of why the batteries has been drained overnight.
Elon Musk ranted in response about a conspiracy to pan electric cars, and cited GPS readings of him driving in circles. There definitely had been instances of biased and rigged reviews against electric cars, but this was pretty clearly a misunderstanding, and Elon Musk never retracted his criticisms once it became obvious what had happened.
Tesla's unconditional supporters didn't do much to quiet potential worries. What should a mild-mannered prospective buyer think? According to the letter of the contracts with Tesla, even having tires on your Tesla rotated could invalidate the warranty on the batteries that cost tens of thousands of dollars to replace. That gives Tesla a lot of leverage to "punish" customers, and the mob of supporters that would gang up on you if you say anything publicly about what seems unfair gives you less recourse and should make people wary.