Action movies make heists look effortless. Carefully planned out routes, fast cars, cunning stunts to get away from police, the whole deal.
But in reality, things are a lot messier than that. Whether it's a bank vault or just petty theft, people do whatever they can to get away.
And in a modern twist, a thief just got away with a pretty crazy heist... of yoga pants. And they used a Waymo to get away, according to the New York Post.
Not a problem, right? Waymo cars are practically plastered with cameras all over, so the cops could just get the footage?
Videos by Wide Open Country
Waymo Didn't Have the Footage
While the police know roughly what happened, the single most useful thing they could have used didn't end up being available.
Here's what they know. Back in January of this year, a suspect pilfered handfuls of yoga pants from the Hot 8 Yoga Studio in the Marina in San Francisco.
They managed to flee using a driverless white Jaguar with Waymo branding on it. Like the world's most unexpected getaway driver, it was parked out front. The suspect apparently used the Waymo to get there and escape.
When police got proper details of the crime six months later, Waymo had already deleted the vast majority of the footage.
But, according to Sergeant Tim Faye, the footage they did get was nigh on unusable. The footage from outside the vehicle had faces blurred, for privacy reasons, according to Waymo.
"It's highly unusual in the first place that a Waymo is even used by a suspect," he explained. "It was disappointing that the internal video was not able to lead to the recognition of a suspect."
But he also summed up his thoughts in a much shorter sentence. "I would think it would be easier to solve in a Waymo."
For the company's sake, they did release a statement about the whole situation. A spokesperson said, "[Waymo] scrutinizes requests from law enforcement to ensure it's legally valid, and will push back or ask police to narrow its scope if needed in an effort to protect rider privacy."
