Reminds me of that article about the ship transporting new Toyotas that tipped over. Half of the cars didn't even get wet, but they pulled all the cars off the ship and destroyed them. It wasn't worth the hassle of inspecting and repairing and still being at risk for liability.
This is/was something traditionally handled with a document signed by the buyer stating the sale is as-is. Tons of broken stuff gets sold all the time.
For one example: Where I'm at, if you sell some things "as-is" and don't disclose all known defects, you can be held liable for those defects regardless of your "as-is" agreement.
Nothing would ruin your brand more than having thousands of new cars breaking down.
Those bikes have been depreciated to a specific value and selling or giving them away might contradict that.
I'm sure Uber tried to sell the whole passle off to companies who do this kind of liquidation thing. The fact that Uber had to destroy them tells me that either A) Uber is making a lot more money by pulling the batteries and motors and selling those while cruching the rest or B) nobody wanted to touch them and Uber got stuck doing this themselves.
I suspect Uber got stuck. LiPol batteries are a liability and probably nobody wanted to deal with them.