How Kansas City police are cracking down on illegal sideshows and street racing
Kansas City police say they are cracking down on street racers and sideshow participants, citing a recent increase in the illegal, dangerous and noisy past-time across the city.
Since June 2020, KCPD has issued almost 70 citations for sideshows and more than 120 to spectators. Last weekend alone, they issued another 31 to participants and two to spectators.
“I think you’re seeing Kansas City try to take a more active role,” Mayor Quinton Lucas told The Star.
Lucas said KCPD is again stepping up enforcement efforts in areas where sideshows are common, including downtown. This will mean more officers in the area, along with more barricades placed on the streets ahead of anticipated sideshow gatherings.
Maj. Stacey Graves said these street takeovers have increasingly been a problem this year. In September, a sideshow spectator was struck by a vehicle and killed in the Northeast Industrial District. In June, two men allegedly chased down and shot at a car carrying two small children — one of whom was reportedly experiencing a medical emergency — after being involved in a crash while they were performing street stunts on Interstate 70.
On Sunday night alone, Graves said, an estimated 90 vehicles blocked roads around KC for a sideshow.
The group started in an area of East 59th Street and Lister Avenue, she told the KC Board of Police Commissioners on Tuesday. Police dispersed the crowd, but about an hour later they reformed at Berkley Park, near downtown.
At the same time, she said, crowds were starting to let out of a concert at the T-Mobile center. KCPD worried about the racers moving downtown with so many pedestrians out and about.
Police intervened and used stop sticks to deflate the tires of fleeing vehicles, Graves said. They also towed a number of disabled cars. A hit and run crash was observed. And after the crowd departed, police found a gun and more than 100 spent shell casings.
‘We didn’t do nearly enough’
The sideshows aren’t confined to just one area of the city, in part because the groups are so mobile, but also because there are numerous hot spots across the metro that have seen these gatherings of motorists for years.
Among these problem areas is Grand Boulevard and Truman Road, downtown.
An 18-year-old recently pleaded guilty to assaulting an officer who was trying to break up sideshow of about 50 vehicles and 100 spectators after street racers blocked the intersection at Truman Road and Grand Boulevard a few Sundays ago. In December 2020, drivers blocked traffic in front of the T-Mobile Center to perform street racing stunts, including “donuts.”
Outside of downtown, Lucas frequently hears complaints about sideshows near Blue River and Grandview roads on the city’s south side, and near Prospect Avenue and MLK Boulevard, to name a few. Some neighbors have been enduring the nuisance for more than a decade.
“We didn’t do nearly enough, I mean, we weren’t doing all the enforcement we needed to,” Lucas said. “I think it’s fair for people to say, ‘What are we getting out of our money?’”
But while some local leaders see the problem as an issue of lax enforcement, Kansas City police officials see it as an issue with permissive local ordinances, despite the stiffer penalties added last year.
In fact, police officials have said in recent years that their ability to stop sideshows is limited by local ordinance, and that they will not chase vehicles just on traffic offenses because of the larger risks of police chases. This means they have to find other means to dissuade racers from taking to the streets.
Lucas, who has even been invited to a sideshow before, said it seems participants historically don’t think the police will do anything.
With this week’s messaging, KCPD is trying to change that.
‘Actively enforcing the law’
In a video posted to their Twitter on Monday, KCPD Sgt. Mike Ward warned that taking part in sideshows could land participants in jail for putting themselves and bystanders at risk by doing reckless car stunts.
Ward added that “KCPD is actively enforcing the law against these side shows.”
Capt. Leslie Foreman, a spokeswoman for the department, told The Star in an email that KCPD has always actively enforced the laws.
“We just wanted the public to know that even despite the challenges of these side shows, we continue to enforce the law,” she added.
While the frequency of these gatherings waxes and wanes, Foreman said when KCPD knows about a sideshow, they typically monitor it from a distance “so as not to escalate the danger from vehicles fleeing.”
Under department policy, officers aren’t allowed to pursue a vehicle for a traffic violation alone, often leaving their hands tied during street racing events. Chasing a fleeing vehicle often creates an even greater public danger.
“We only interject ourselves into an exhibition of vehicle racing if there in an imminent danger posed by someone with a weapon or other life endangering action, or in the event someone has reported being injured,” she said.
But city and police officials have yet to find a perfect solution, since sideshows themselves can be deadly, as illustrated by the death of a sideshow spectator in September.
Ordinance changes possible
In May 2021, the City Council passed legislation, sponsored by Lucas, creating stiffer penalties for illegal street racing. Under the new law, first-time offenders get a fine of up to $150 plus as long as 30 days in jail. The fine and jail time doubles for a second offense; and for three or more a driver may be fined $500 and spend six months in jail.
Vehicles used for such activities may also be impounded through the municipal court if a judge signs off on a warrant. Additional provisions apply to spectators of unsanctioned street racing events, who may be fined up to $100.
But police leadership believe more can be done.
KCPD patrol commanders are scheduled to meet Thursday to review current city ordinances related to street racing and sideshows. Graves, the KCPD major, said they will consider making recommendations for ordinance changes to the city.
For example, she said, current ordinance requires a search warrant to seize a vehicle. This prevents KCPD from seizing street racers’ vehicles, as some other law enforcement agencies around the country are doing.
Graves said KCPD will also be asking the prosecutors office to impose the highest possible punishment for those being ticketed related to sideshows.
Lucas said in recent weeks, he and City Manager Brian Platt have had productive conversations with Interim Chief Joe Mabin about the problem.
“Sometimes it’s easy to say we don’t have enough people, and that’s true, but I think the department is trying to be as creative and versatile as possible to make sure that even if just deploying certain resources,” Lucas said, adding that most enforcement is as simple as just asking people to leave.
But problems are more likely to arise when those people refuse to disperse, or when weapons are involved.
A dangerous past-time
Lucas emphasized that the risk isn’t just out of control vehicles, but also shootings.
He referenced what began as a car parade on Southwest Boulevard in 2020, where 19-year-old Daisy Martinez was fatally shot after a fight broke out at what had been advertised as a family-friendly car event.
In February 2021, at least two people were shot, an officer’s vehicle was damaged by gunfire and dozens of people were ticketed as street racers tore through the city, prompting police to call a press conference the following day.
In May 2021, seven people were shot in three separate locations following altercations that broke out after more than 1,000 people and hundreds of vehicles gathered at an illegal racing event in the 7100 block of Eastwood Trafficway
Lucas said the dangers of sideshows are real, and he’s encouraging community members to report illegal sideshows by calling KCPD or the city’s 311 line.
“People think it’s nostalgic and kind of like the movie Grease or something,” Lucas said. “But what we’re seeing is they’re adding the dangerous vehicle, and then putting in connection with it a gun sometimes, circles, big crowds, drinking, drugs. That’s the sort of thing that we want to make sure doesn’t go unanswered here in Kansas City.”
Lucas said moving forward, there will be consequences for anyone who continues to “terrorize neighborhoods” with the loud and dangerous shows.
The city is working to find safe spaces where people can “smoke their tires” without it being a public safety risk, Lucas said, possibly at events when the weather warms up.
But for now, police are stepping up efforts to put the brakes on sideshows, with the public’s help.
“We really need the public to step up to help end or diminish these activities,” said Foreman, the KCPD captain. “The main way to do that is to not participate and to not attend as a spectator. Both can be very dangerous.”
