No More Oldsmobiles

Too bad we don't have a kills section.



Cars Crushed In Street Racing Crackdown

I love this quote:
"We are making a dent," said Ontario police Cpl. Jeff Higbee.

rotarygod

As much as I hate street racing, seeing states do this crap pisses me off even more. It doesn't surpirse me that this is California. America's most expensive overpriced unflushed toilet. This isn't going to cut down on street racing at all out there. All it's going to do is make more kids run from the cops in an attempt not to lose their car. I would! You don't have to outrun the cops. You only have to outrun the guy you were racing. If you are losing it anyways, there's not much else to lose. If I had a car crushed like that, you can be sure I'd make a very public statement against it. Probably in the form of building another car as a mockery of the system. That's just me. I hate all authority.

SE3PSynergy

I agree one hundred percent... they are just throwing gasoline on top of the fire by doing this. It's just ridiculous.

chrism

i agree with rg 100%....i would be doing the same damn thing.....and from what i read these cops impounded the car for stolen parts not racing......cali is one big scam of a state and its kinda sad that most of our spo-com culture originated from there

No More Oldsmobiles

The owner, I'm sure.

Phade2

I wouldn't pay the note and let the bank repo it....here you go! and hand them the mashed metal cube. lol.

and RG I agree with what you said except for that California crap.

AJ's Shinka

A lot of if I saw my car getting crushed. Good thing I don't partake in this street racing stuff. Time to play Forza.

MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

Though I think this is a bullshit law in a bullshit state, this part caught my eye:

LionZoo

I'm just going to copy past what I wrote on miata.net:

***

I think one of the reason cops love targeting "street racers" is that they're often poor and uneducated and make good headlines. "Your tax dollars at work, fighting the evil street racers that terrorize your children by driving circles around them while they're walking home from school." These kids probably have an extremely poor understanding of their rights and have very little money for legal action and so are extremely easy to victimize. It's a win-win for the police. Of course, the cops must have our best interests in mind and not their own right? That's why there's so many speed traps all around after all!

Another thing that comes to mind is that cars with JDM engine swaps won't have matching VINs with the chassis. I don't think JDM engines are well documented with the DMV or any other government outlet, so do the police simply assume that the engine is stolen (guilty until proven innocent) unless you can prove otherwise? Obviously what is needed is a good legal case with a defendant that has the resources to fight it, but sadly I don't see this ever happening. Maybe LoanShark should buy that ITR, swap in a JDM engine, and take a drive to Ontario.

***

California tends to do this and it tends to come in waves. Whenever the cops feel like wanting some good press for whatever reason, street racing is one of the first things they target. After awhile, the press will stop covering it and the cops will go back to how it was like before. Having followed this phenomenon for awhile, it's scary how similar the remarks are every time they have a crackdown. "We're winning, it'll be difficult, but we want to give them something to think about." I don't think the cops actually want to stamp out the racing, or else they lose a valuable source of chest pounding.

No More Oldsmobiles

I think this might have something to do with it, too:

LionZoo

"Responsible for or suspected in" means about as much as "speed related" on police reports. An accident is "speed related" as long as one person was going faster than the speed limit. It doesn't matter if someone ran a red and crashed into another driver going 5 mph over the limit, that's "speed related."

Here's another fun article: http://www.thestar.com/News/article/227464

It seems it's even worse in Canada, they'll seize your vehicle if they suspect you're going to race it. Sort of like thought crime.

No More Oldsmobiles

Now you've got me defending the cops -- my fingers are recoiling in pain just typing this -- but are you really suggesting no one ever gets killed because of street racing?

No More Oldsmobiles

One other thing that comes to mind is this list of the cars most often stolen:

The CCC reports the ten most stolen vehicles for 2005 are as follows:


2001 BMW M Roadster
1998 Acura Integra
2004 Mercury Marauder
1999 Acura Integra
1995 Acura Integra
2002 Audi S4
1996 Acura Integra
1997 Acura Integra
2001 Acura Integra
2000 Jaguar XJR

Six out of ten ain't bad.

LionZoo

No I'm not suggesting no one ever gets killed, but people get killed for all kinds of different reasons and the way they worded it I don't think their number of deaths supposedly caused by street racing is accurate. I'm just comparing it to speed related since Car and Driver once had an article on what merited an accident to be classified as speed related. If you just looked at the published numbers like "75% of all accidents are speed related" you'd think, my God if we just punished all speeders the roads would be so much safer. However, if you dug deeper you'd realize not all that many accidents were caused by speed. I think it's the same here. Those numbers are great for headlines.

With your stolen car count, are you saying if the cops keep crushing cars with supposedly stolen parts there would be a decrease in car thefts? I'm not sure chop shops will just give up chopping cars simply because demand from one arena decreases, plus I'm not sure people "racing" Integras make up a huge portion of the market for illegal parts. At one point Camrys were some of the most stolen cars in America, was that because of "illegal street racing"?

No More Oldsmobiles

You seem to be saying that street racing is no worse than doing the usual 5 mph over the limit with traffic. I disagree.

Yep.

If they target cars with stolen parts, it reduces the incentive to buy stolen parts. Some jerk tries to save a few hundred bucks and winds up loosing a few thousand. It sinks in.

Crushing cars might not be the answer, but targeting people with stolen parts is part of the solution. Go after chop shops, too.

Car theft hits everyone in the wallet because it drives up insurance premiums. Target the b@st@rds, I say. But look, you're denying the links between A) street racing and street crashing, and B) the theft of parts and the market for stolen parts. You can cite all the in-denial sources you wish.

MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

The problem with the stolen parts racket is that the end purchaser gets his car crushed because he is in possession, though he typically has no idea that the parts that he bought are stolen.
Plenty of "legitimate" shops use stolen parts to help their bottom line. They don't pass any particular savings on the the customer, they just make a bigger profit.

There was a bit in the Post a few years back where they went looking for all the stolen airbags. That is a favorite item because the profit margin is so high. They figured that more than half of all the airbags replaced under the Honda and Acura brands were stolen.

In any event, crushing the racer's car does nothing to the flow of stolen parts but increase it. That poor kid is now determined to build another rice rocket and he has even less funds with which to do it. Where do you think he is going to look for parts?

Rootski

iTrader: (1)

Anything that gets rid of Civics is okay with me.




Except this. This is stupid.

LionZoo

You misunderstand me. I'm not saying it's not dangerous, I'm calling into doubt the "official" numbers that are supplied because as we can see "speed related" could mean just about anything and is rather misleading. I'm sure there are safety gains to be made if all street racing were eradicated, but there are also gains to be made if all speeding was eliminated too; the gains just aren't as high as people are led to believe. I also am not denying the link between stolen cars, but again I don't think the gains are as high as you believe.

Police departments, despite their wishes, have a finite amount of resources and every single one of those resources costs taxpayer money. I'm not sure it's a good allocation of resources, but I definitely know it's great press. For the record, I haven't heard of one chopshop bust in LA County in quite awhile, but hearing about street racing crackdowns is a pretty regular occurance.

Finally, this is a slippery slope. Putting up speed cameras at every few hundred feet is "safer," but then there would be cameras everywhere and the police department would be rolling in revenue. I'm not even sure how much "safer" it would be, but it would be "safer." Do you drive the speed limit everywhere you go? Likewise, there are tons of parts sold on rx8club every day and a few of those items could be hot. If you inadvertently buy one of those said parts from here, does your car deserve to be crushed? Likewise, my mechanic might be sourcing his part from shady sources and he installs a used transmission that he says is from the junkyard, but is actually stolen. Who is left holding the bag? You can say "Well I wasn't street racing", but then you have to consider, does the punishment fit the crime? "Street racing" with a stock car is a ticket, but "street racing" with a car that you might have unknowingly bought a stolen part for gets your car crushed. Does speeding in a car with a stolen part be enough to warrant a car crushing?

You might believe LA County (actually San Bernardino County in this case) would do their due diligence before crushing someone's car, but spent most of my life in LA I can tell you from what I've seen that's probably not the case. The cops don't care about you unless you can bring against them substantial legal action.

Rhawb

Man, I hate to say it, but I think that blue Civic at the bottom of the pile may have been due for a crushing. I mean, Jeebus, maybe they should have invested some of that mod money into buying some taste.

But, in other news, this is just more proof that most police agencies are out there working in interest of looking like the good guys to your common idiot, no matter the cost to the little folks. Solving crimes is no longer an issue, it's now all about revenue generation and media praise. I'd applaud them if they were sending record number of rapists and murderers to the chair, but they're not. They've simply taken some 16 year old's pride and joy and smashed it to pieces while they watched. That solves nothing - they will race again, and I can guarantee that there are so many street racers out there that having 5 cars crushed won't do a damn thing to even slow down the problem.

This is moronic, go out the and solve some real crimes instead of sitting behind a billboard, picking off fish in a barrel who are driving over the speed limit with no other traffic around. Hell, I'd even be happy if they caught the tailgaters and aggressive drivers! But they never do. It's always the same story - "you were caught doing 15 over."

Razz1

Street racing does kill.

Something has to be done to curb this.

There's Calf. Speedway for dragging and Plamdale.

The problem is drivers education and training...not going fast.

It's all drivers error..

devildog1679

Oh, yea that's smart; ruin your credit while you’re at it. I agree with what they are doing, I think it would be better to donate the car to charity's that need cars. Though they may need to tune them down. If your car has stolen parts then it should be confiscated, the same goes for severe reckless driving. If you break the law, prepare to pay the price. Yea I would be pissed but no one else to blame but myself. They can do the same thing legally by attending sanctioned events. Probably much cheaper than all the tickets and risk of getting your car towed away for good. Good for them.

tajabaho1

OOOOOHHHH SO THATS! what the cops were doing on nogales street........I went by in my new bodykit rx-8 and there were billions of modded cars all over the place, and there were also at least 20-30 cops pulling people over left and right.....thank god I had no exhaust on.......the rx-8 next to me didn't.......I guess his car was impounded..........it was very...very.......scary

alfy28

man i thought okinawa japan had it bad. meaning on certain nights of the week, the JP police will have traps set up on the side of a major busy road. And when ever they see a car that is modded they have that car pull over to the side ot get a ticket and have all mods stripped by a certain date and pay 1k+ dollars for reinspect. and this is just being in traffic (not racing)

but cali wow they destroy . but is this only if they catch you racing, or both mod and racing?

jskup1

iTrader: (7)

I agree that that they should be going after street racers and part thieves. But if you're caught with a stolen stereo in your living room they don't bring out the wrecking ball.

No More Oldsmobiles

I'm no cheerleader for the cops. Still, if some 90 year old dude falls asleep behind the wheel and crashes, I don't think the cops are going to tell the press he was street racing. When they cite street racing, I suspect they have a reason -- corroborating witnesses or supporting evidence. I don't buy it that they are trying to classify ordinary accidents as street racing just to get some publicity. There has always been street racing, and the cops did not create the current tuner culture. It's there. It exists. They aren't imagining it.


I'll take any gains that lower my insurance.

If you buy a stolen part without knowing it, the police should seize it and ask you where you got it (but not seize your car).
But get this -- they would then want you to cooperate in tracking down the seller. The police are more interested in the big fish. Most crime investigations start at the bottom and work their way up.

So why aren't the cops giving these "innocent" drivers a chance to inform upstream? Maybe there is no upstream. The drivers can't point to a physical shop, a specific dealer, or an online seller, because they bought the part in a back alley from a shady dealer without giving a rip that it was stolen. Or maybe they stripped the parts themselves.

Many racers are kids who want to put tens of thousands of dollars of modifications into their cars. Some don't have the money. A certain few of them then support the car-theft market or steal parts themselves. I have no sympathy for them. They drive up my insurance so that they can go out and do stupid stuff.