Caught on camera: Illegal car meetup on Chicago's Near North Side
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Saturday night was a late night for some people living on Chicago's Near North Side. Video shows what appears to be an illegal street car meetup right outside their homes on the corner of Wells and Oak.
Images of the incident were posted on TikTok overnight. It runs just under a minute but gives a good idea of the chaos that unfolded.
Nearly 24 hours later remnants of those tire marks remained at the intersection.
"I just heard some loud noises and the engines revving and I come outside to see just the entire block closing in," said the man who posted the video on TikTok. He asked to remain anonymous.
It was just after 11 p.m. Saturday when he looked out from a friend's balcony at a high rise overlooking Oak and Wells. An apparent illegal street takeover was underway at the intersection. In these takeovers pedestrians block off traffic in all directions, allowing for a car to drift in circles.
Things quickly took a dangerous turn and a TikTok user captured the moment with his cell phone.
"There is someone standing on the side, trying to get a close-up or something and then it kind of smacked. It knocked him over and I think he got up," he said.
The takeover caused a traffic jam that lasted nearly 20 minutes, he said.
A police cruiser responding to the scene appeared to just idle and not engage with the crowd. It left long time residents in the Near North neighborhood like Regan Burke baffled.
"I don't know why the policeman did not intervene. I don't really know, but it's really bad to have this happen here. It was bad when it happened in the South Loop," said Regan Burke.
While these meetups are nothing new to the city--as CBS 2 has covered numerous illegal street racing incidents over the years, some even fatal--one resident said this is not a regular thing to see in this neighborhood. A new ordinance put into place last July was designed to crack down on these takeovers and give CPD the green light to issue thousands of dollars in fines and impound any vehicles involved.
It's unclear if it was even enforced Saturday night.
"They didn't really seem too urgent to stop it. It was like more so of being just a presence," said the TikTok user.
CBS 2 reached out to CPD to get more information on this incident. According to them, a call was made to report the incident, but a report was never filed because nobody was at the scene at the time officers arrived.
