Just over a week after a team of international climate change activists called ‘The Tyre Extinguishers’ struck on the Upper East Side– claiming to have ‘disarmed‘ dozens of ‘killer’ SUVs— police have released video showing three suspects caught on camera tampering with the tires in Lenox Hill.
Surveillance video taken from a building on East 65th Street between Third and Lexington Avenue shows two men and a woman— all wearing masks and believed to be 18 to 20 years old— approaching a blue Volvo SUV after midnight on the morning of Tuesday, June 28th.
The woman then crouches down near the front passenger wheel of the SUV as one man watches— that’s when police say she used a tool of some kind to let the air out of the tire.
As that’s happening, a second man can be seen putting a flier under the windshield of the Volvo.
“You’ll be angry, but don’t take it personally,” reads the note purportedly left behind.
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“It’s not you, it’s your car. We did this because driving around in urban areas in your massive vehicle has huge consequences for others.”
The activists, who spell tire the British way, previously confirmed to Upper East Site that its members targeted SUVs parked in the East 60s near Fifth Avenue that night.
Details of the ‘strike’ were first reported by Streetsblog New York.
Investigators say the Volvo SUV seen in the surveillance video was just one of multiple vehicles tampered with in the area during that time.
“It’s really upsetting,” said Michelle, an Upper East Sider whose family’s SUV had its tires deflated on East 65th Street last week.
“They think they’re helping climate change, but the amount of trucks we had to call to repair our cars really didn’t help the environment in any way,” she added.
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‘The Tyre Extinguishers’ say their vision for the world includes banning SUVs in urban areas, pollution taxes on all SUVs and a massive investment in mass transit.
Reached for comment, the group told Upper East Site that “no member of the Tyre Extinguishers, anywhere in the world, has been caught yet. We don’t think these people will be caught and we will
not be stopped.”
If you recognize anyone in the surveillance video or have any information that could help police, you’re asked to call NYPD Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-8477.
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