ATLANTA — Police have a message for street racers: Stay home this weekend.
Channel 2 Action News met exclusively with several metro Atlanta law enforcement agencies about a planned event for this weekend.
A DeKalb police lieutenant said a team of state and local law enforcement has unearthed intelligence about the possibility of street racers from across the country converging on metro Atlanta this weekend after a legitimate track event in Macon. But they said it would be intelligent not to come here for street racing unless you’re OK with jail.
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“Don’t do your takeovers here. Take it to the track,” said DeKalb Lt. Timothy Donahue.
Donahue said so called “takeovers” are posted on YouTube.
“These takeovers are basically like flash mobs, centered around reckless driving exhibitions in intersections or in large parking lots,” Donahue said.
GBI Director Vic Reynolds said in May at an intersection near The Varsity, a man toting an assault rifle helped orchestrate a takeover but the GBI tracked him down and arrested him under the new street racing bill that Gov. Brian Kemp signed. Reynolds said they found two assault weapons.
“We’re gonna provide a safe environment for all our citizens in the state of Georgia and also for those visitors,” Reynolds said.
Georgia State Patrol Captain Ritchie Howard said state and local partners have been cracking down on street racing and other crimes on weekends since early April. He said troopers will be out in force this weekend.
“If there’s street racing and they are apprehended they, will be going to jail,” Ritchie said.
“It’s not anything outside what we will be able to handle and address,” said Atlanta Police Deputy Chief Celeste Murphy.
“It’s gotten really bad all over metro Atlanta,” Donahue said.
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“Noise complaints from the modified mufflers, a lot of these things are affecting the quality of life of our citizens,” Murphy said.
“We’ve seen people get struck by vehicle, we’ve seen head-on collisions where vehicles were racing to get to the next location where innocent people were just driving trying to get to their destination and ended up in a head-on collision” Donahue said.
Authorities said they always take street racing seriously but warn they are taking things “up a notch” this weekend.
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