Austin rock-throwing attack causes thousands of dollars in damage

AUSTIN, Texas - An Austin man claims a homeless person threw large rocks at his car while he was driving. The incident has caused thousands of dollars worth of damage.

Gaurav Goel’s car now has two large dents in it after an encounter he and his wife had with a homeless man about two weeks ago.

"It doesn't look like they're big dents, but they're very deep dents," he said.

He took his car to an auto repair shop and said the damage is going to cost him a pretty penny.

"I just got the estimate back. I think it's like seven or $8,000 worth of damage on the car," he said.

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On Saturday, June 10, Goel said he and his wife were driving to brunch at around 10:30 a.m. when he ended up on the Mopac southbound access road. There, he was stopped for a red light in the left lane ready turn on Southwest Parkway when they noticed a homeless man with a sign.

"He was relatively incoherent. He was very tall. He had a big backpack. He had a very angry demeanor on his face. I kind of avoided eye contact with him," said Goel.

Thinking nothing of it, Goel remembered starting to turn left when the light turned green. As he was turning, he said he heard a very loud thump.

"He apparently pulled out a big, huge rock out of his backpack and he hurled it at our car, and it hit the driver's door and it was really loud and then suddenly we had a second rock that hit the back of our car," said Goel.

Goel said he and his wife were terrified.

"I mean, it's terrifying. It was easily a force that could have smashed the window if it had just been slightly higher," he said.

He said he called 911, and the dispatcher immediately directed him to 311 who then told him this was a call for 911.

"And the lady at 311, she said, 'no, this is a 911 call, you need to call 911' and she apparently instigated an internal complaint like while we were on the phone, like they literally were feuding with each other," said Goel.

Eventually, Goel was able to file a police report online. The case is being investigated as criminal mischief.