Cash App founder Bob Lee fatally wounded in San Francisco stabbing

Bob Lee, a chief product officer at cryptocurrency company MobileCoin, has passed away after a stabbing incident in downtown San Francisco.

The San Francisco Police Department said its officers responded to a stabbing report at around 2:35 a.m. on Tuesday (4 March) near the 300 block of Main Street in the city’s Rincon Hill area.

They found a 43-year-old adult male with apparent stab wounds upon arriving on the scene, the police said. The man was taken to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries and later died.

The police homicide department has opened an investigation, but no arrests were immediately made. The police did not say who the victim was, but NBC Bay Area and CBS Bay Area identified the man as Lee shortly after.

“Crazy Bob was an incredible human being,” MobileCoin founder Joshua Goldbard tweeted, referring to Lee by his nickname. “I don’t know how to fix what’s wrong, but I know something isn’t working in our grey city. Bob left this world too soon,” he added.

1/ Thread 🧵

.@crazybob was an incredible human being. Saying bob’s name in the past tense feels ridiculous.

I don’t even know where to begin.

undefined Joshua Goldbard (@ThePBXGuy) April 5, 2023

Before joining MobileCoin, Lee created CashApp and was the first chief technology officer at Square, a mobile payment company now known as Block.

“Heartbreaking. Bob was instrumental to Square and Cash App,” Block CEO Jack Dorsey said on nostr.

Earlier in his career, Lee also worked for Google, contributing to Android's development. He was also a serial investor, including in companies like SpaceX, Clubhouse, Figma, and others.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted he was “very sorry” to hear of Lee’s death and said San Francisco had a “horrific” violent crime problem.

Very sorry to hear that. Many people I know have been severely assaulted.

Violent crime in SF is horrific and even if attackers are caught, they are often released immediately.

Is the city taking stronger action to incarcerate repeat violent offenders @BrookeJenkinsSF?

undefined Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 5, 2023

According to the latest available police data, there have been eight homicides in San Francisco as of February 2023, compared with six in the same period last year.