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Comment by drugme | Hacker News Reader

I don’t understand what the story here is supposed to be.

Did you catch the parts about Tesla harassing Tripp in a whole bunch of outlandish and basically thuggish ways in response -- ranging from a bogus $167m lawsuit up to apparently lying to the local police about him planning a mass shooting?

That's what the story was about.

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The article certainly makes those claims. But Bloomberg doesn’t seem to have any evidence of those things, beyond Tripp’s raw assertion that his friends didn’t make the call and he didn’t do what the lawsuit says. With no corroboration, why should we believe him over Tesla at this point?

With no corroboration, why should we believe him over Tesla at this point?

Occam's Razor (and Tesla/Musks's record of erratic and vindictive behavior in other contexts) should provide ample basis for making that call.

> Occam's Razor

This seems like an objectively bad idea to me. I'm not a Tesla or Musk fan, and it seems plausible he could try to destroy a whistleblower.

Even so, "innocent until proven guilty" is the better standard. Occam's Razor is greatly influenced by our priors.

We're not on a jury deciding whether to convict Elon Musk of a crime. We're trying to determine what likely happened and who is likely telling the truth, and possibly what implications that should have for our judgment of Elon Musk's character or broader questions around Tesla as a company.

> Even so, "innocent until proven guilty" is the better standard

You're confusing this with the legal system. Normal people outside that don't have access to formal investigative powers and resources. Their only course is to use their best judgment based on what they do know.

Where greater penalties like fines and jail are involved, a corresponding greater standard of proof is required.

You should definitely not use Occam’s Razor to convict someone in court, true. You should probably use something besides “has a court already convicted this person” in your personal life though.

Occam's Razor isn't about determining criminal liability.

> Why should we believe him over Tesla at this point?

"Funding secured."

Also, your assertion that there is no corroboration is wrong, the new whistleblower Sean Gouthro is corroborating Tripp's claims. This behavior is also well in line with Elon Musk's established pattern of paranoid behavior in surveiling employees.

Again, that's certainly the narrative the article presents. But Gouthro did not (as far as is included in the article) corroborate that the accusations in the lawsuit are false or that the shooting threat was fake. He does corroborate the story that Tesla sent PIs to tail Tripp - because Gouthro himself sent those PIs, in response to the shooting threat that Gouthro himself saw.

You are also incorrect that Tripp's original info release did not establish or indicate wrongdoing. Tesla claimed industry-leading levels of scrap expense in their financial filings. They are almost certainly capitalizing scrap as R&D expense.

What makes you think they're capitalizing scrap as R&D expenses? Just because they have a lot of it?

Funding in Elon's mind could have been secured - perhaps not to what SEC's requirements of what that meant however; if I had $100B to invest in taking Tesla private, I'd certainly give it to Musk - Saudi Arabia is throwing around huge amounts as well, which I believe was his believed source of funding.

What Elon believes the requirements are and what the legal requirements are two different things.

Not to mention that Tesla failed to file an 8k form in a timely manner, and when it was finally filed it clearly showed that funding had not been 'secured' under any reasonable definition.

The idea Elon Musk "believed in his mind" that funding was secured is pure sophistry. He has done hundreds of fundraising rounds in his life and knows the various stages involved in intimate detail.

He was obsessed at the time with squeezing shorts and probably thought he could touch off a VW-style spike in the stock. Ironically, by capping the upside at $420, he presented shorts with one of the best risk-reward profiles in the stock's history, and that days intraday high has never been seen since.

So let's do an exercise. You have someone you trust someone's word, they tell you they're going to pick you up at X time and Y location. Do you trust them, why do you trust them? So now, why can't this same scenario exist for Elon and someone, say Saudi money, for securing funding - someone saying they will give you all the money he needs to take Tesla private? You're presenting no proof it was a fallacious statement from him, based on his belief of what funding secured meant. You're also presenting a very one-sided argument. Elon also yes "hates" - so arguably it makes at least equal sense, if not more, that he'd legitimately want to take Tesla off the stock market.

Gouthro or Gourthro?

Interesting, he was formerly "head of investigations" at Tesla and was involved with spying on Tripp back in August 2018:

> Police eventually reached Tripp, who said he was at a local casino with his family and would meet with officers. Police then heard from Gourthro again and informed him that they were set to speak with Tripp at an undisclosed location. Gourthro correctly guessed the meeting spot, telling police later that he knew because “little birds sing.” [1]

Now this guy is saying,

> “They had the ability to do things I didn’t even know existed,” he says. “It scared the shit out of me.” [2]

And Tesla is saying,

> A Tesla spokeswoman said in a statement that Gouthro’s allegations “are untrue and sensationalized,”

When you fire your head of investigations who was previously unconnected with the whistleblower.. and then deny that anything he says is true.. Yikes.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-01/tesla-s-p...

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-13/when-elon... (this post's article)

The police report from the "mass shooting" event included two officers accounts of comments from Tesla employees that seem to indicate Tesla had some way of intercepting Tripp's communications. I'll try to find the document on scribd again.

Edit: The police report[1] starting on page 4. I think it's also noteworthy that the person whose comments seemed to indicate Tesla was tracking Tripp's phone was Gourthro who has just filed a whistleblower tip (supposedly) corroborating Tripp's allegations.

[1] https://www.secwhistleblowerattorney.net/tesla-related-polic...

Rich people are evil, Musk is rich, therefore Musk is evil. That's all the evidence we need. Lock him up ;p

On a serious note though, it does annoy me that rich people these days always seem to have an excuse for everything and they have access to the best lawyers to come up with the all the right bullshit and PR needed to protect themselves.

I bet there are a lot of wealthy criminals getting away with things simply because of the way the legal system works.

If Musk did this, then he should get some jail time because it's not acceptable. Given the power imbalance, the viciousness of this act is on par with assault.

Because musk/tesla have a... questionable record with truth and safety, and all these guys claims were about said transparency/safety? Why do you trust musk/tesla over tripp?

One obvious answer is that Musk/Tesla have way more to lose than a random employee by lying. Any random person can lie about anything with pretty minimal downsides, even if they're caught red-handed in that lie.

A company and its CEO have way more to lose in getting caught in a lie, which puts a slight preference towards believing them in uncorroborated he-said-she-saids like this.

Also: "innocent until proven guilty" is a phrase that seems to be eroding away, which is a terrible, terrible thing. The real move here is not to believe either party until you have irrefutable evidence; there is likely some amount of wrongdoing on both sides but none of us are in a position to make judgement calls without that information.

According to the article, the call about the mass shooting came only hours after his email exchange with Musk.

This is, by definition, circumstantial "evidence" at best. It infers a connection between two events that have no direct evidence connecting them.

And then Tesla "declined" to make the call receiver witness available. And asked the Sheriff to put out a press conference anyway and say the threat was credible. And then put out their own press release when the Sheriff declined because it wasn't.

At some point, the progression of circumstances reduces the possibility of alternatives.

No -- according to the article, while a call did take place -- the "mass shooting" aspect of it was most made up by the Tesla people.

So you do understand what the story is supposed to be? What did you mean then? Confusing comment.

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