Florida Man Says He Attacked Fancy Cars That Reminded Him of College Bullies

A man in Tampa, Florida, was arrested Wednesday for allegedly going around splashing corrosive chemicals onto a couple of luxury cars, the Tampa Bay Times reports. Within the span of about a week, he allegedly poured either brake cleaner or rust remover onto a Porsche, and then used some unknown chemical on a Mercedes 500 that was parked at a movie theater.

When asked why he caused about $3,000 in damage, Scott Stone, 37, reportedly told police that the cars "reminded him of vehicles driven by people who bullied him in college."

Stone's currently behind bars in lieu of a $4,000 bond, and while that means the fancy cars of West Florida are safe for now, his story feels far from resolved. Aside from the general "why?" many questions remain—for example:

When I was in college, my friend had a habit of letting his car run out of gas. To remedy this, he didn't just miraculously become more responsible. Instead, he just started carrying a tank of gas in his trunk, making it unbearable to be in the car with him for an entirely different reason—the constant smell of gasoline boiling in the Florida sun.

Does Stone just drive around with chemicals in his car, on the off chance that he sees cars that vaguely remind him of his tormentors from literally 20 years ago? Probably pretty toxic in there!

My aforementioned friend drove a car that had TEAR YOUR BODY APART written in Sharpie on the steering wheel and that disintegrated (not from chemicals) before we graduated. That's arguably the kind of car you're supposed to be driving around in college. But in Stone's case, his college bullies were apparently driving around cars that cost more than a year of college tuition.

But in case you're tempted to attribute this vandalism spree to some sort of class-resentment, Stone himself apparently drives a Mercedes, the Times reports. Maybe there are no easy answers with this one.

Obviously bullying in a problem in middle and high school, but college? The clique system that exists when you're a kid mostly evaporates once you get to that point in life. Apparently, college kids need cry closets now, but as far as I know, it's not because NCAA athletes are giving English majors noogies. Fraternity hazing does technically fall under the general umbrella of bullying, but if that's what Stone was a victim of, he did a really strange job of phrasing it to the cops. Beyond that, though, I'm having a really having a hard time coming up with a single plausible scenario in which someone in college could or would be traditionally "bullied" for their lunch money or whatever.

I mean, the guy is 37. What was so bad 20 years ago that enraged him to the point of being unable to pass a BMW without wanting to douse the thing in chemicals? And why even bother at this point?

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