LionZoo

I went back and reread the article again since it was bugging me and here it is: Notice that nowhere in the article does it say any of the mentioned individuals were convicted of street racing, merely that they were "caught." If that is the case, then the only premise that the cops currently have crushing the cars is the presence of stolen parts, which is a pretty weak premise since when our Camry's transmission went my dad's mechanic replaced it with a used one (not much point in putting in a brand new tranny in a car worth $4,000). If so, it seems the cops are using the presence of stolen parts as an excuse to crush the cars to make an example of people that are accused of street racing (i.e. they haven't had their day in court yet). Remember court orders (such as arrest warrants) only need one party to be present to be given.

If they were convicted of street racing, that's a punishment that can have jail time. If they were convicted, the article failing to mention so is a pretty bad journalistic oversight in my opinion to leave that fact out.

TheKDog

Even better would be to leave the perpetrators IN the car during the process.

Kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

Rootski

iTrader: (1)

They're all wrongly accused... no civic could get going fast enough to hurt anybody.

350zFan

true dat!! cars like that (civic, rx8, etc) should be exempt from this law!!

Shini

Street Racing may kill people, but no where near as many as Drunk Drivers.

Why not just seize a druk drivers car and scrap it? Sure it's already wrecked, but they are bound to get back after it's repaired and they go through a whole set of court dates and what not.

I had a friend that got a DUI and his license got suspended for 2 months, did he stop dringing though? :rollseyes: NO.

I've done some street racing before, and I tell you one thing, if I EVER had my car demolished for it, I would probably go off on a killing tangent or some other psychiotic act, just as the California government is doing to these kids.

It's a dangerous thing to do, but more often than not it's done on a closed street or somewhere very vacant, the chance of hitting someone or being injured is pretty low unless you're just a tool and don't know how to operate your own vehicle and you go out of control somehow.

I can understand having their car impounded for awhile, or maybe even some jailtime, but having your car totaled? Is that even legal? What if that is your only form of transportation? Granted most of the racing in Cali probably have daily driving cars, but if it's some punk kid that just wanted to make his one and only car like something out of the Fast and Furious movie, all that money he put in to it, gone just because of street racing?? I mean, Jesus Christ, you could lose your job over things like this, how can the government even allow that to happen to someone?

Not defending the Street Racers, but until they start killing a more signifigant amount of people than Drunk Drivers do, then back the f*ck off them!

saturn

For all the people upset at the cops I'd love to hear your solution. What do you want them to do? If they make the penalties stiffer and start to put street racers in prison it'll just feed into the overpopulation. If you do nothing people will continue to die.

The cheapest and easiest thing to do is destroy the cars. People are going to run from the cops if the penalty is stiff enough and they're not going to change their ways if the penalty isn't.

9krpmrx8

iTrader: (46)

Exactly.

BTW, are those Mugen rims they crushed? Why not auction that stuff off and let the proceeds go to charity.

BaronVonBigmeat

I can think of several things off the top of my head:

* A massive fine

* Auction off the car to people with clean driving records

* GPS unit in their car, or a similar ankle bracelet; if they travel too fast, it's detected automatically

* A law that allows a landowner to open a strip where people can race, and allows the landowner to be exempt from "waah I drove like an idiot but it's your fault" lawsuits

* A law that prevents tracks from being shut down by neighboring homes, if the track was there first. That's a real problem in California apparently; a track or airport in a secluded area opens up, but then a developer builds next to it, and pretty soon the HOA is filing a lawsuit.

Shini

No ones mad at the cops about them taking action against the Street racers, it needed to be done.

But why are the penalties for that much much higher than it is for someone that gets a DUI?

As people have stated in this thread, cops are pulling over people they "suspect" or racing or having stolen parts, they aren't even convincted.

So why does a convicted offender of a DUI just get some jail time and their license suspended? They cause more deaths per year, probably even per capita in Cali than a street racer could even if he had a score board and was actually trying to kill people.

Overpopulation is just a thing they'd have to deal with. You can take routes as to suspend their license, impound the car for X days, and arrest them. Totaling someones car isn't the route to go.

And even though they do kill people (I've never heard of any reported cases in my city EVER.), and this may sound morbid and *******-ish, but the number is so small, why are they taking such a huge step to stop something that probably puts a dent in the population? I say keep the same course and just hand out tickets and make them evacute the area's where you see tons of people at racing, arrest them, etc etc. People are just going to have to deal with the fact that if you get behind the wheel YOU ARE AT RISK, the approach you're taking to this saturn is you agree with it because you think it will stop street racing? Pfffft. Hell no it won't, they can do everything in their power to TRY to stop it but they won't, even if they are totaling peoples cars etc etc, it will still happen and people will still die, so if people are still going to die then what do you think they should do? Don't ask us for different idea's on how to stop them, you should think of some yourself, because this isn't going to stop it entirely.

As it stands, this is just like people dying from diseases, people who do drugs and share needles and die from infection, things like that, it's population control, if there weren't so many retards out in the world doing stupid things America would end up just like all the other 3rd world countries everyone laughs and points at and mocks.

My comment still stands, until they take as harsh or harsher punishment for Drunk drivers who kill more americans per year than street racers, this is just ridiculous and out of control enforcement.

I'm sure the # of people that die in America from street racing accidents is no where as high per year than the number of Drunk drivers that kill people in California.

If you think this should happen to a street racers car, what should happen to a Drunk Driver? Should we put their car under that too but them with it since they kill more people?

Shini

Good idea's.

Shini

Not a bad idea either.

saturn

^ I'm with you on the penalties for DUI's. I personally think people should lose their licenses for a year on their first offense with much stiffer penalties for repeat offenders.

LionZoo

Having lived in LA and will be back living in LA in another month, I can tell you that LA County has much bigger problems than just street racing. Even better, if the cops want to crack down on street racing, why not break up the races before they happen to ensure nobody gets hurt rather than wait until the race happens and crush their cars? A cop showing up at a large gathering will pretty much ensure that racing won't happen, as well as anything else really bad such as drug use and alcohol abuse. We've had cops at our gatherings and they're cool and everyone gets along and has a good time. However, the LA cops prefer to try to infiltrate a group and go for the big bust to confiscate everything Hollywood style. That method I feel is wrong and not even very effective.

636

This just angered me entirely. You cant justify taking someones property , crushing it and giving off excuses for stolen items. I use to really respect cops , Im even in the process of becoming one..but seriously cops in california are real dicks (most of them anyway). This kind of thing reminds me of that certain period of time when cops took extreme measures for speeding with a motorcycle. There was this time when cops use to shoot , ram , use spike strips on speeding motorcyclists. That isnt solving anything. They're just commiting murder, not to mention they say things like "we just want to prevent an accident" so nobody gets hurt. BS , killing a motorcyclists will make the bike fall and inevitably hit SOMETHING at very high speeds. Chances of the biker actually hurting someone more then himself is very very minimal. Either way , this isnt the way to handle such a petty crime. Nobody else sees how unfair the law is becoming? Imo its becoming really ridiculous. I mean seriously , theres even curfew at night now for teens. If you're out "too late" then you get a ticket. lol , talk about prison like. Free country my *** >_>.

RX8-79

I think it's funny as hell. They should put it on pay per view, and I'd gladly pay to see it.

I hate these f'n idiot streetracers; fines, paralyzing wreck, jail, whatever they get they deserve, but this outcome is definitely the most entertaining.

LionZoo

I can tell you that that's because there's a portion of California cops that simply want you to respect their authoratay and when you don't seem to cower in fear at their presence they get pissed off. Luckily that portion is a minority, but a very active minority and they ruin it for everyone else. I hope you won't become that sort of cop.

Cromax

Yeah they can, but then, you can always put that stuff back on after they check it

alfy28

lol yah we always end up putting things back on the next follwing weekend after reinpsect

9291150

Can't believe those who still buy everything their government feeds them. We got our f*ckin media dying for headlines that only breeds opportunistic politicians that implements laws that have little to do with real issues.

Last I checked, most deaths on the roads are caused by driver error. Society uses this nice term - "accidents" to describe them...as if the steering wheels are falling off their cars while they're driving them.

It's rarely an "accident", rather it's inattentive, careless or poorly skilled drivers that cause death on our roads EVERY DAY - it just doesn't make headlines. It's car driving coffee drinkers, cell phone users, lunch eaters, make-up appliers, radio fiddlers, presentation reviewers, etc. that are killing far more than street racers.

Yet when they get into an accident, it's deemed an at-fault by their insurer and - oh well, car gets fixed and everybody goes along their merry way.

I can't drive one frigg'n block on my motorcycle without seeing careless and inattentive drivers; you become much more aware on a bike and it's alarming. But forget all that, we can't pick on everyday people, lets devote our attention to "street racers" and charge them disproportionate and exorbitant penalties since they're confirmed responsible for .08% of accidents. And even better, the rest of us driving anything sporty will have to endure constant harrassment 'cause we might be one of them.

The Ace

Have you all said "goodbye" to your Human and Civil Rights yet ?

Unless you can PROVE that the whole car is stolen (in which case it should be returned to the rightful owner anyway), the whole concept is ridiculous. Even if you discover that a certain indivindual is sheltering stolen goods, do you justify tearing down his house ?

Damn, "1984", "Escape from L.A./N.Y." et al will seem a distant pleasurable alternate universe in a few years....

saturn

Personally, I welcome our car crushing overlords.

9291150

You probably bought into the "just say no" campaign too.

It'll only cause more racers to run, and who's safer then?

But using your logic, shouldn't we crush more? Crush people's cars with two or more at-fault collisions, or DUI's, or...

saturn

All I'm saying is that they should turn whatever solution they come up with to this problem into a game show.

I'm just personally a fan of punishing behavior that leads to big problems. If someone kills someone because he's drunk driving you can get into big trouble. If you get pulled over while drunk and haven't killed anyone yet you get a slap on the wrist. This is crap.

If someone is street racing, do something with their car. Maybe crushing it is wasteful, but do something with it. Everyone is so worried about everyone running because you have "nothing to lose". If someone runs from the cops arrest them, fine them $50k, and suspend their license for 2 years. Now they have something to lose.

Are you saying we shouldn't enforce stiff penalties for street racing on the off chance it might cause some people to run?

The Ace

You should always balance the crime with the penalty.

I'm one of the people that think that the death penalty IS warranted in some cut-n-dry cases, but in this case destroying a car simply because i.e. the turbo installed in it was stolen and the car *might* have been racing is completely ludicrous....

Elara

I think it's kinda stupid to destroy the car when they could probably make some money on it, but those of you defending street racing and street racers in general, I've got a question for you.

If these "kids" (and I use the term "kids" lightly) can afford to spend $10k+ on mods, why can't they afford to go race ON A TRACK where it's legal, (relatively) safe, and aren't going to get their asses busted by the cops?

(edited, because I was being kinda rude too.)