19-year-old vandalises 17 cars at college parking lot, then confesses crime to ChatGPT in lengthy chat

A bizarre case out of Missouri has put both college life and artificial intelligence in the spotlight. A 19-year-old student at Missouri State University allegedly went on a destructive spree in a campus parking lot and later admitted everything not to police at first, but to ChatGPT, a report by Smoking Gun revealed.

Authorities say Ryan Schaefer, a sophomore, vandalized 17 cars early Sunday morning around 3 AM. According to the police report, Schaefer smashed windows, ripped off side mirrors, dented hoods, and snapped windshield wipers in what investigators described as a “rampage.”

When police confronted him with surveillance footage and other evidence, Schaefer admitted there was a “resemblance” between him and the suspect. He then agreed to let officers search his iPhone. That’s where they discovered a striking piece of evidence: a long, profanity-laced conversation with ChatGPT, where he confessed to the crime almost immediately after it happened.

In the chat, Schaefer asked bluntly, “How fucked am I” and “qilll I go to jail,” riddled with typos. He then confessed to smashing “multipls cars,” before becoming increasingly aggressive, even threatening the AI. Later, he tried to reassure himself, writing that he had “got away with it last year” and believed there was no way he could be identified. At one point, he admitted it felt “really nice” to cause the damage.