‘Fast & Furious’-style terror hits Bay Area: ‘Sideshow’ drivers block roads, pull guns, do donuts
By Michael Kaplan
July 13, 2023 8:00am
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRi0PDAJUbY&ab_channel=KTVUFOX2SanFranciscoIf the looting of retailers, rampant hard drugs, and a homeless population growing more quickly than the regular one were not enough to make the Bay Area city of Oakland unlivable, add the challenge of so-called “sideshows.”
Counter to the carnival-inspired name, sideshows have proven to be a menace to law-abiding citizens.
Despite trying, the Oakland Police Department, which endured budget cuts, has not stopped the high-speed hoedowns.
Sideshows — which began benignly, in the early 1980s, with car aficionados gathering to peacefully show off their beloved rides next to a carnival in the Foothill neighborhood of Oakland — evolved into impromptu, dangerous and menacing meet-ups.
These days, sideshows are street spectacles that involve participants suddenly shutting down four-way intersections and even major bridges, and using the expanses of asphalt to put on displays of cars, often with blacked-out windows, doing extreme donuts.
The driver stomps on the gas pedal, rapidly accelerates to 50 or so miles per hour, lifts his foot from the clutch, and forces the rear of the car to spin out.
“You can have hundreds of people watching,” city resident Cheral Stewart, who has worked in tech marketing, told The Post.
“Then they start skidding their cars, drifting and doing donuts, one driver after the other. Take photos of the license plates and people will pull guns on you.
A California Highway Patrol helicopter monitoring one sideshow picked up a large crowd watching multiple cars doing donuts at an intersection.
more w/photos
https://nypost.com/2023/07/13/fast-furious-style-terror-hits-bay-area-sideshow-drivers-block-roads-pull-guns-do-donuts/
