By David DeKok
HARRISBURG, Pa., Aug 3 (Reuters) - Philadelphia police said
on Monday they will not investigate the weekend vandalism that
ended an experimental robot's attempted hitchhiking trip across
the United States unless the Canadian universities that own it
file a criminal complaint.
The child-sized robot, named hitchBOT, had safely hitchhiked
across Canada and through parts of Europe.
But its trip from Boston to San Francisco ended abruptly on
Saturday in a Philadelphia alley, where it was found with its
head removed.
"We can't do anything without a complaint being filed,"
Philadelphia Police spokeswoman Leeloni Palmiero. "If they did,
we would absolutely investigate."
The robot's owners said they have no interest in mounting a
criminal prosecution.
"We wish to remember the good times, and we encourage
hitchBOT's friends and family to do the same," the team behind
the project said in a statement posted on the hitchBOT website.
(http://m.hitchbot.me/)
"Sometimes bad things happen to good robots."
HitchBOT was the brainchild of professors David Harris Smith
of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and Frauke Zeller
at Ryerson University in Toronto.
Smith said on Monday that the team has not decided whether
to rebuild the robot. He said the material cost of the original
hitchBOT was only about C$2,500 ($1,900 U.S.), but that
"hundreds of hours of work" would be necessary for a new model.
"There is a lot of testing to make sure everything will
work," he said.
HitchBOT left Salem, Massachusetts, on July 17 and made
stops in Boston and New York City before traveling to
Philadelphia. The team that built him intended for hitchBOT to
hitch-hike to San Francisco, with stops at places like Mount
Rushmore and the Grand Canyon.
It was 3 feet (91 cm) tall and weighed 25 pounds (11 kg),
according to Ryerson University. The robot could not move and
was dependent on motorists stopping and lifting it into their
vehicles.
In the summer of 2014, hitchBOT crossed Canada, from
Halifax, Nova Scotia to Victoria, British Columbia in 19
separate rides lasting 26 days. It has also hitchhiked through
Germany and the Netherlands.
($1 = 1.3154 Canadian dollars)
(Editing by Scott Malone and Eric Walsh)