Tempe Police Shut Down Illegal Street Takeover With Over 1000 People

TEMPE, AZ —The Tempe Police Department said it was forced to break up an illegal street takeover in a local parking garage on Saturday night that featured between 300 to 500 cars, over 1000 people and even food trucks.

Sergeant Hector Encinas, a Tempe police spokesperson, said the takeover was the largest his department has seen in Tempe. He said the organizer of the event was given a criminal ticket for aiding and abetting reckless driving, which is a class 2 misdemeanor. A report from 12News.com indicated four others were cited during the gathering.

Street takeovers, where cars gather on public and private property to perform stunts and compete in races, have become increasingly common in the valley.

In March, the Phoenix Police Department announced that its Street Racing Task Force, which was established in Feb. of 2021, had become permanent.

Encinas said the TPD is not part of the task force, but said the department was in touch with representatives from the task force about Saturday's incident, and Phoenix police were among the 10 officers who helped break up the gathering.

"This is a valley-wide thing," Encinas told Patch. "Phoenix has cracked down on takeovers that have happened on the west side and in other areas, but it's slowly creeping into other jurisdictions."

Encinas said the task force is an important tool for combating such incidents because it allows departments to share intelligence about possible street takeovers, work together on strategies for breaking up the gatherings and pool resources at the scene.

According to Encinas, Tempe police were on alert about reckless driving behaviors last weekend after a local television station aired citizen shot footage of cars doing doughnuts in the parking lot of Lowe's Home Improvement at 777 E. Baseline Rd, on Friday.

Then, at 8 p.m. Saturday, a Tempe police officer reported cars gathering at the parking garage located at 2185 E. Cameron Way, near the Tempe Marketplace shopping mall.

"We started seeing some folks doing doughnuts and other things, and we tried to be proactive," Encinas said. "We don't want this to get out of hand. It's a large parking garage near the marketplace on a Saturday, not to mention that none of them had the right to be there because it's a closed garage and they were trespassing."

Encinas said officers at the scene identified the organizer of the event and spoke to him about the consequences of such a gathering. Encinas said the organizer was cooperative and that police facilitated everybody leaving the area, which he said was cleared by about 11:30 p.m.

Encinas said he believes officers broke up the gathering before too much reckless behavior took place.

"It was just starting up, and that's part of the thing we're trying to do, be proactive. Encinas said. "We were there before it started getting out of hand and festering."

According to Encinas, some of the participants may have attended the gathering thinking it was a legal event.

"Some folks were there to hang out and they were not really participating in reckless behavior, and they had the belief that this was a normal car event," Encinas said. "This is not that. You're meeting on a Saturday evening at a closed business in a parking garage, that is not going to be sanctioned."

In addition to being illegal, Encinas said the police are paying close attention to these types of gatherings because they threaten the safety of both participants and innocent bystanders.

"It's not only for the safety of the people nearby who are watching, but also the folks doing these things," Encinas said. "They get together to have fun and get their thrills, but those things can result in you hurting yourself or killing yourself or someone else. This is risky behavior, it's a public safety issue and we have to shut it down."