Sideshows and speed contests draw crowds, but police warn of dangerous consequences
Street racing in Los Angeles shows no sign of slowing, and police, by their own admission, have largely failed to crack down on the sometimes-deadly high speeds.
Blame it on a combination of weak laws and young racers who take advantage of the situation, quickly setting up and moving speed signs and spreading their message via social media.
The Los Angeles Police Commission last week heard a report examining current laws and their effectiveness in cracking down on road racing and sideshow behavior, including revving up vehicles at high speeds to damage road surfaces. The report included an analysis showing a significant increase in some incidents in the first half of 2024 compared to the same period last year.
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The analysis tallied 176 reports of street racing in the period ending in late May, up 49% from last year, while 190 street takeovers were recorded, slightly higher than the 187 recorded in 2023.
“Current legal remedies have little deterrent effect and are insufficient to adequately combat these crimes,” the report said.
Los Angeles Police Deputy Chief Donald Graham told the committee that enforcement measures have limited effectiveness. One problem, he said, is that many racing-related crimes are misdemeanors tried in traffic court. They often lead to diversion programs that authorities don’t adequately track, he added.
One potential threat could be vehicle impoundment, but Graham said street racers often find ways around this issue, such as reporting their vehicles stolen before a race. The analysis found 69 impoundments reported so far this year, down 68% from 214 in the same period in 2023.
A long history
Street racing has long been part of the Southern California landscape, and complaints about dangerous incidents are nothing new. Crosstown detailed another LAPD report last year that compiled complaints about speed contests and sideshows, finding that the San Fernando Valley and South Los Angeles were particularly susceptible to high numbers of calls.
The new report shows the number of traffic tickets issued this year is up, with 103 speeding citations issued, up from 49 during the same period last year, and 31 reckless driving citations, a 138% increase compared to the same period in 2023.
Graham said the department’s efforts will include looking at solutions to allow the activities to take place in a safe, controlled environment, citing examples of municipalities that sanction legal racing at drag strips or set up temporary “barn boxes” for sideshow stunts.
The aim, he said, is to find options “that will weed out the kids who are only interested in the sports part.”
There are many examples of unsanctioned events going wrong. On Christmas Day 2022, a driver doing donuts at a sideshow in Hyde Park lost control and drove into a crowd, killing a 24-year-old nursing student. A month later, the Los Angeles Police Department announced the arrest of 27-year-old Dante Chapple Young of Orange County. The District Attorney’s Office filed murder charges against Young.
During a street siege in Vista, Vermont, earlier this month, dozens of people broke into and robbed an AutoZone store.
Methodology: We looked at publicly available street racing reports from the Los Angeles Police Department. Learn more about the data here.
To perform our calculations, we rely on publicly available data from the Los Angeles Police Department. The LAPD sometimes updates past crime reports with new information or reclassifies past reports. These revised reports do not necessarily automatically become part of the public database.
If you have any questions or would like more information about our data, please contact us at [email protected]