Suffolk cracking down on street racing

Suffolk County is slamming the brakes on illegal street racing.

A subculture that claimed the lives of at least three people on Long Island since 2005 is being controlled by police in each Suffolk precinct who target racing hot spots and focus on arrests and car confiscations, authorities said.

The dangerous and destructive nature of illegal racing was highlighted last week when two men were arrested on charges of driving 140 mph on the Long Island Expressway before their cars crashed across the street from one another. One struck a gas pump and burst into flames and the other hit a fence.

Though both cars carried passengers, no one was killed or seriously injured in the crashes.

Since 2005, when three people were killed in illegal street races, law enforcement and penalties have been strengthened, Suffolk Assistant Chief of Patrol Patrick Cuff said. He said the result has been that both the number of incidents and of races organized on the Internet are down.

"I think the mere fact that we don't get that many complaints anymore on the organized drag racing, I think it was effective," he said. "We saw a lot more of it back then than we're seeing now."

Now, each Suffolk precinct has a task force with officers targeting racers. Rather than issuing summonses, officers arrest suspects and confiscate their cars, Cuff said. A 2006 Suffolk County law allows police to seize and then auction the vehicles. The number of cars taken since the law was enacted was not available Sunday.

Hot spots targeted

Suffolk County Police Commissioner Richard Dormer said the task forces target racing hot spots and monitor the street-racing community.

Authorities, through the intelligence they received from the task forces, began to break up popular race locations, usually deserted areas such as Heartland Industrial Park in Brentwood, Cuff said.

In 2005, Suffolk police made eight arrests and issued 144 summonses for illegal racing. By 2006, summonses dropped to 24, while arrests rose to 32. The number of summonses has remained low since then, with 17 issued last year, and nine arrests.

At least one officer in each precinct focuses on finding illegal street-racing meetings and coordinating police crackdowns on them, Cuff said. In Nassau, county police issued 23 summons each in 2009 and 2010. And the Suffolk sheriff's office, which patrols the LIE and Sunrise Highway, says it issues about six summons annually.

But it is the threat of seizure that might be keeping street races at bay.

Robert Sinclair, a spokesman for AAA's New York region, said the seizures, along with a visible police presence, are changing the culture.

"It's a pretty big hit if someone were to take your vehicle," Sinclair said. "It seems there definitely was a culture change fostered by more aggressive law enforcement."

In last Thursday's crash, the two drivers remain in police custody, sheriff's spokesman Chief Michael Sharkey said.

Their 2005 Dodge Neon SRT and 2003 Mitsubishi Lancer Evo whizzed westbound past a Suffolk deputy in Ronkonkoma on the LIE and crashed as they left the highway at the next exit in Islandia.

The Neon's driver, Joseph Skarka, 20, of Central Islip, and the Lancer's driver, Jeffrey Browne, 21, of Bohemia, are charged with engaging in an unlawful speed contest, second-degree reckless endangerment, reckless driving, criminal mischief, unlawful fleeing from a police officer and speeding, police said. They are due back in court Wednesday.

Police presence called key

Sinclair said AAA supports a visible police presence on roads over speed cameras, which he said are of little or no deterrence to speeders. "Cameras do nothing to remove speeders from the road. Law enforcement being out there makes a difference," he said.

Suffolk is a good example. "We haven't encountered as many organized street contests," Cuff said of the past few years. He said officers continue to search for signs of illegal racing through the Internet and on patrol. "They [racers] will try to find wherever the police aren't."

With Mark Harrington and Will Van Sant