Earlier this month, St. Louis Police sought to put stunt drivers on notice. They seized some of the ATVs and dirt bikes that have long bedeviled city residents and even debuted branding for the initiative: Use it. Lose it. Mayor Cara Spencer vowed a bigger crackdown on reckless driving.
But on Sunday night, stunt drivers showed they weren’t afraid. They showed up in force in Holly Hills, making a huge ruckus and leading to numerous 911 calls around 8:50 p.m. Neighbors, including state Rep. Steve Butz (D-St. Louis), questioned why it took police 30 minutes to show up.
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“This was pre-planned flash mob type stuff,” Butz tells SLM, saying that the event was well-coordinated, as evidenced by the fact that non-stunt driving cars double parked in the street to block off traffic, and then shined their lights at the cars doing doughnuts and other stunts so that they would film better. (A video he posted to Facebook captures the scene, including an angry woman shouting at neighbors, “Y’all are outnumbered!”) Says Butz, “This was a spectator sporting event.”
Police spokesman Mitch McCoy, however, said that a commander was on the scene within 23 minutes of the first 911 call. There were just two problems: Officers who had been on the way to the scene were instead diverted to a call for a firefighter in need of aid after a crash at Hampton and Gravois—what McCoy calls “the most serious high level” call. And the commander who continued on to Holly Hills (without lights and sirens, and therefore probably unnoticed by many residents) reported that the stunt drivers had moved on. His reconnaissance allowed other officers to head directly to Kingshighway and Christy, where the stunts had begun all over again in a vacant parking lot.
Police spiked 25–30 vehicles at the scene, McCoy says, as other drivers fled. They stopped at another location before officers then spiked 15–20 more at 9th and LeBeaume in Near North Riverfront.
McCoy portrays the police response as a success.
“This sends a pretty clear message: If you come into the city and you engage in this behavior and you flee, you’re going to be spiked,” he says. “The neighborhoods are frustrated with it. We are frustrated dealing with it, but I can guarantee you the people that are frustrated today and tomorrow are going to be the people that are spending hundreds of 1000s of dollars to replace their tires.”
But not everybody has that takeaway from the seemingly out–of-control gathering, a moving crime scene that left many locals frustrated on Mother’s Day.
As for Butz, he says that he spoke to police chief Robert Tracy, who explained the same timeline as McCoy. He’s sympathetic, but also concerned that the incident speaks to the understaffing that’s plagued the department.
“I get you’re chasing them to other places. But when there are that many people out at that time, live shooting it, it shows we just don’t have enough cop cars,” says Butz.
He’s also not sure if the department’s tough talk backfired.
“My opinion: Set low expectations and overdeliver a few times,” Butz tells SLM. “I know you got plans, but clearly this was a step back in terms of what you’re up against.”
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story provided the wrong title for Mitch McCoy. He is a police spokesman, not a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety. We regret the error.
