Mom, good Samaritan smash Tesla window trying to rescue toddler son locked inside hot car
LOS ANGELES - "I don't want this to happen to anybody else," says Kassandra Pineda. "What I went through was just awful."
On Monday, September 9, on a scorching hot day, Kassandra Pineda faced the scare of her life.
"It was hot. The last time I checked the monitor, it was 109 degrees outside, so I can't even imagine how hot it was inside," Kassandra said.
"She was all over the place, just saying, 'My baby, my baby, my baby, please break the window, break the window," Adrian Ortega said.
He and Kassandra were charging their cars at a Tesla Supercharger in the San Fernando Valley.
When Kassandra stepped out to disconnect the charger, her Tesla unexpectedly locked her out, with her 13-month-old baby boy, Liam Valenzuela, still inside.
"I started banging as hard as I could, but it wouldn't break," the mom said.
Tesla's security cameras captured the dramatic ordeal.
Adrian recalls Kassandra yelling, "He's in there… my baby, please call 911, break the window… it's horrifying seeing someone screaming… it's unreal."
Adrian and Kassandra both tried to break the window. Adrian used a fishing weight in a desperate attempt.
"I was grabbing it like this, with all my weight, I was trying," he said.
But the window remained intact.
"My biggest fear was opening that door and finding my son without life. I can't imagine anyone going through that," laments Kassandra.
Finally, Adrian grabbed the weight with his fingers and swung it with force, shattering the window. It took eight agonizing minutes to get Liam out of the hot car.
Adrian says he'll never forget that baby.
"Oh, he was scared… once I opened the door, he was sweating… it looked like he had just taken a shower or a bath," he said.
When Kassandra contacted Tesla, one employee mentioned a possible software update that could have caused the problem.
However, after a diagnostic test, she was told: "They said nothing was wrong with the car. They couldn't give me an explanation."
This incident is not the first time a Tesla vehicle has locked a driver out. A similar incident happened to an Arizona grandmother whose car battery died after she had just buckled in her grandchild.
"I am terrified. I don't want to drive that Tesla anymore. My son could have lost his life that day, and it's very scary," says Kassandra.
After taking her car in to investigate the issue, Kassandra discovered that the footage from that day — and only that day — had been deleted. She says she confronted the employees, but they couldn't explain.
We contacted Tesla for comment, but they have yet to respond.