CLEVELAND — Chaotic scenes like a takeover on Interstate 90 left drivers shocked and scared even to be out overnight on weekends in Cleveland.
It was like something out of a thriller.
“I had 12 passengers panicking,” Tim Beck said.
Beck drives a party bus for PST LLC.
He was on I-90 at 4 a.m. Sunday, taking people home from a night out downtown when a masked mob took over the interstate and attacked the party bus.
“Within a few minutes we had people hanging on the windshield, we had them hanging on the side mirror,” Beck said.
Beck said he came up on orange barrels blocking his path. Just ahead, he said, there were about 100 people doing donuts and pouring gasoline to start fires. The highway was gridlocked.
“We dialed 911 immediately. I got a voicemail recording that took six minutes for them to call me back,” Beck said.
During that wait, they were surrounded by the mob banging on the windows and door.
Beck said it took about 30 minutes before he saw police lights, but by then, he managed to escape.
“I moved the car and a lot of orange barrels, I drove right through,” Beck said.
There was a similar scene over on the East side, where University Circle police were taunted at Martin Luther King Jr Drive and E. 105 Street.
Police investigating felony crimes.
“What’s particularly disturbing about all of this, kind of the brazen cavalier attitude that they have,” Chief Thomas Wetzel said.
A police sergeant was hit in the face by airsoft bb’s.
“These might be some points that were contacted with those bb’s pellets,” Wetzel said as he pointed to a police cruiser.
Wetzel said the two officers tried to keep innocent bystanders out of the chaos until Cleveland police came as backup.
“That is not something two police officers and one cruiser can handle, not even close and they shouldn’t,” Wetzel said.
Just last week, News 5 Investigators showed you the mayhem with car meets and takeovers. A teenager was shot at one of them.
Exclusive one-on-one with Police Chief Annie Todd.
Drivers do burnouts in shopping center parking lots and intersections.
West 25th Street and Lorain Avenue near the West Side Market is one location.
“It was going on for 10-15 minutes, and we were wondering like where the police were,” Charlie Anderson said.
Anderson said it’s been a weekly thing at that intersection in Ohio City.
He captured video from Sept. 8 and was awakened again by this weekend’s chaos.
“Even when the police did come it didn’t really seem like much was going on they were still continuing to do donuts while the police were there,” Anderson said.
In a sit-down interview, Todd told News 5 Investigators that this is a priority for her.
On Sunday, the chief called the response by officers great.
But was vague about arrests.
“Outrageous what took place,” Cleveland City Council Safety Chair Mike Polensek said.
News 5 Investigators asked Polensek if the city lost control of the streets.
“I would like to say no but there are a lot of residents and businesses that believe they have,” Polensek said.
Polensek wants to know about arrests and a game plan for future disturbances.
“The people are scared to come into the city,” Polensek said. The party bus owner worries about his livelihood."
“We make our living from people coming downtown from tourists. All this is doing is scaring people away and businesses are going to go down,” said PST, LLC Owner, Joe Zkiab.
Beck said he knows a dozen people who are now frightened after what happened on I90.
“We have 12 passengers in the bus that stated they would never come downtown Cleveland again,” Beck said.
State lawmakers passed a bill this summer increasing penalties for street takeovers both for those in the driver’s seat and those who stand in the roads blocking intersections.
It takes effect next month.
Cleveland police said they’re working on a city-wide investigation. News 5 is still waiting for pictures, and the chief said they would be released.
