Street racing meetup results in injury, arrest and talk of crackdown in Brookhaven
Suffolk County police car. Credit: James Carbone
One person faces charges and another was injured in a street racing meetup at a Patchogue shopping center that appeared to spread to other parts of Brookhaven overnight, police and town officials said.
Suffolk Police said they broke up a "car meet" at about 1:15 a.m. Sunday in Gateway Plaza on Sunrise Highway.
Danya Northington, 19, of Roosevelt was allegedly spotted by police "fleeing the area at a high rate of speed" and was located and arrested a short time later, police said. She was charged with third-degree unlawfully fleeing a police officer and reckless endangerment, both misdemeanors.
Another 19-year-old woman who gathered to watch the cars in the parking lot was struck by one of the vehicles "doing donuts," police said. Officers learned of the injury shortly after 3 a.m., when the woman took herself to a local hospital with what police called "serious, but not life-threatening injuries."
Suffolk Police detectives are looking to determine if the Patchogue event was related to motor vehicle incidents reported a short time later along Route 25A in Sound Beach and Miller Place, and also on William Floyd Parkway in Shirley. Social media videos of the incidents showed cars drifting, a technique where a driver intentionally oversteers, with loss of traction, driving sideways while maintaining control around a corner.
Brookhaven Town Supervisor Dan Panico said that while individual drivers are occasionally caught illegally drifting on public roadways, what occurred in the early hours Sunday appeared to be part of a "planned night of chaos."
"It was absurd," said Panico, who added that multiple town council members learned of the incidents in their communities overnight. "I think [police and prosecutors] have to crack down and come down hard on people who do this."
Panico said one video posted to social media showed multiple cars drifting at an intersection in Miller Place, with several bystanders looking on. He said the video showed the intersection blocked as an ambulance approached.
"That was the most galling video of all," Panico said.
The supervisor said after talking to county officials about the incidents Sunday that he is confident police have the means to investigate and track down the drivers shown in various videos posted online. He said he’s hopeful the vehicles could be seized under the law.
"If it was just the incident in the parking lot, that's bad enough," Panico said. "But to block major intersections on arterial roadways so ambulances can't get through is just shocking."
Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.
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