Internal combustion cars in electric charging stations: e-drive unit beaten
It ended in a fight, with an internal combustion engine driver taken to the emergency room, over the usual uncivilized issue of gasoline cars parked in charging spots reserved for electric vehicles. This is Paride Orlando’s unfortunate experience, which he recounted in the Facebook group “VaiElettrico – Discussioni & Consigli,” and we later spoke with him on the phone. It happened in Rome, but this bad practice is widespread throughout Italy. Perhaps increased presence of local police and other law enforcement to enforce regulations could help address a problem that has become all too frequent.
Gasoline cars in charging spots: fight with a girl, father arrives, and violence breaks out
Paride Orlando told us that he wanted to charge his electric car, a Tesla. He had been waiting in line for a long time with his wife and daughters in front of a spot occupied by a gasoline car parked illegally. “I told the girl that she couldn’t stay there; we needed to charge our car. She replied, ‘Come on, everyone does it.’ I insisted that wasn’t true and that we couldn’t wait for someone else’s convenience,” Orlando recounted. Instead of moving the car, the young woman started a video call with her father. “She said, ‘I’ll connect you to my dad now.’ I covered my face and said, ‘Don’t record me.’ She replied, ‘Then I’ll have him come over.’”
Paride thought the man would come to clarify things. “That he would ask me what had happened. Instead, he got out of the car and headbutted me.” From there, the situation escalated. “The son, or nephew, I don’t know, punched me on the left side, breaking my eye and cheekbone. Then he grabbed me by the hair and kept hitting me.”
His wife and daughters witnessed the entire scene. They, along with other people present, separated the attackers and called an ambulance and the police. Two patrol cars arrived. Orlando was taken to the hospital, where he was diagnosed with facial injuries. “My lawyer will file a complaint tomorrow,” he explained to us.
This is Paris’s version, which we cannot verify independently. Nevertheless, the bad practice of occupying charging stations and the resulting tensions—which are becoming increasingly frequent—are clear. It’s a very plausible story.
Driving a Model Y
Paris drives a Model Y Performance. He is no stranger to arguments over charging stations. “It happens often in Rome. The other time near my daughter’s school, I called the police. In Europe it’s never happened to me: Netherlands, England, Spain… no one has ever occupied a charging post. Only in Italy do you end up at fault for asking that the law be respected.”
His testimony fits into a broader pattern: hostility, vandalism, cut cables, and sabotaged charging posts. “They’re installing a new charging post right behind my house. They put it up last afternoon. Today they already cut the cables.”
READ ALSO: Bonus for charging stations, hope remains. VIDEO-GUIDE to the incentive
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