For the past four weekends in a row, a private parking area on Southlawn Lane in Rockville has been the scene of a car rally that continues to grow in size and destruction.
Joseph Colandreo, president of Seneca Glass Company, said it started small with a handful of people doing donuts or watching drivers perform and then leaving trash everywhere. They came around 2:30 a.m. and were gone in about an hour.
“The first weekend, it wasn’t that bad. They just left a lot of trash” and someone urinated on his company door, he said, adding that the second week was pretty much the same.
On the third weekend, more people showed up. He estimated that there were between 50 and 60 people.
Then on the weekend of April 4 and April 5, “probably 200 people came,” he said.
He has not witnessed the rallies but has seen parts of them on his company surveillance video.
“It’s out of control. It’s pretty crazy,” he said. He described the participants ranging in age from teenagers to adults.
Someone told him that he was in his car, and some people started spitting and tapping on his car.
Colandreo has contacted the police. “They told me my best option was to hire security.” he said.
County Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Earl Stoddard said it is difficult for the police to handle car rallies unless they are notified well in advance. Police staffing in the early morning hours usually is lighter than during the day, he said.
“Now that we know” that these car rallies are occurring regularly, “We can now strategize,” he said. “We don’t know there is going to be a rally” this weekend, he added.
Car rallies are difficult to patrol and “very unsafe,” he said.
Colandreo said he does not “want to see these kids get in trouble,” but that it needs to stop, because “they are crossing the line.” The participants leave behind trash and car tracks, and someone can get hurt, he said.
“Nothing good can come out of it.”
