Just two days after a Molotov cocktail was hurled at OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's Russian Hill residence in San Francisco, another violent episode unfolded at the same address. Early Sunday morning, April 12, 2026, San Francisco police responded to reports of possible shots fired near Altman's home.
Around 3 a.m. on Sunday, April 12, officers responded to a report of possible gunfire in the 2000 block of the Russian Hill neighborhood. Surveillance footage and security reports indicated a Honda sedan drove past Altman's property; the passenger extended an arm from the window and fired one round toward the Lombard Street side of the residence. The vehicle fled, but its license plate was captured.
Investigators linked the car to Amanda Tom, 25 (the driver and registered owner), and Muhamad Tarik Hussein, 23 (the passenger). Both were arrested without incident on nearby Taylor Street. A search warrant executed at a residence yielded three firearms. The pair was booked into San Francisco County Jail on suspicion of negligent discharge of a firearm. No injuries were reported, and no one was inside the targeted area at the time of the shot.
SFPD has not publicly confirmed whether the shooting specifically targeted Altman or his home, describing it as an "apparent shooting near" the residence. Police Chief Derrick Lew emphasized the department's zero-tolerance stance: “The SFPD takes crimes involving guns extremely seriously and anyone committing acts like these will be arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
Investigators pinpointed the owner of the car, identified as Amanda Tom, 25. She and Muhamad Tarik Hussein, 23, were arrested not far away, on Taylor Street, police said. Officers served a search warrant at a home and seized three guns, police said.
Tom and Hussein were booked into jail on suspicion of negligent discharge of a gun. -Chronicle
"The SFPD takes crimes involving guns extremely seriously and anyone committing acts like these will be arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law," said Police Chief Derrick Lew.
The shooting comes amid growing public anxiety over the societal impact of AI, from job displacement to the massive infrastructure demands of data centers. Last week's Molotov cocktail suspect drove to OpenAI headquarters and threatened to burn down the building.
On Friday at around 3:45 a.m., 20-year-old Daniel Alejandro Moreno-Gama allegedly threw an incendiary device at the metal gate of Altman's home on Chestnut Street. The device sparked a small fire that security quickly extinguished, with no injuries reported. Moreno-Gama then traveled to OpenAI's Mission Bay headquarters, where he allegedly threatened to burn down the building. He was arrested there using surveillance footage.
The suspect, originally from Texas, faced serious charges including attempted murder, arson, making criminal threats, and possession of destructive devices. He remains held without bail. Online writings attributed to him reveal deep concerns about AI as an existential risk: he described unaligned models as capable of deception and warned that tech leaders were "gambling with our future" without sufficient morals. He had engaged with groups like PauseAI but was not an active organizer calling for violence.
OpenAI confirmed the attack and expressed gratitude to the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD), noting heightened security measures. Altman himself responded hours later in a personal blog post, sharing a family photo with his husband and child. "I love them more than anything," he wrote, adding that he hoped the image might "dissuade the next person from throwing a Molotov cocktail at our house, no matter what they think about me." He acknowledged underestimating the power of "words and narratives," referenced a recent critical New Yorker profile amid "great anxiety about AI," and called for de-escalation: "While we have that debate, we should de-escalate the rhetoric and tactics and try to have fewer explosions in fewer homes, figuratively and literally."
As we noted on Friday, the timing and tone of Altman’s response appear to underscore a deeper reality now playing out across the country: financially strained American households are increasingly pushing back against the infrastructure demands of the AI industry. New data this week shows residential electricity prices surging in key regions, driven in large part by the explosive growth of data centers needed to train and run large language models.
Communities from Virginia to Georgia to the Midwest have mounted growing resistance - through zoning fights, moratoriums, and public hearings - over electricity costs, water consumption, land use, and limited local economic benefits, marking what one analysis described as a sharp escalation in Americans starting to revolt against data centers.