Viral YouTube Video Ends With Criminal Charges – and Controversial Police Tool May Have Led to Arrest

Story by the Associated Press, curated by Jason Howerton

–

NEW YORK (AP) -- A driver who allegedly posted an Internet video of himself speeding around Manhattan in just over 24 minutes is facing charges of reckless driving, authorities said Friday.

According to a criminal complaint charging Adam Tang with reckless driving, Tang claimed he never went over 100 mph and ran only one red light at a pedestrian crosswalk.

Tang, 30, appeared Friday in court in Manhattan but did not enter a plea. Bail was set at $10,000 bond or $5,000 cash. His lawyer did not respond to a phone message seeking comment.

(YouTube)

Police had arrested Tang on Thursday and seized his 2006 BMW Z4 after news reports began surfacing about a YouTube video, posted last week by a user called AfroDuck, that chronicled the nighttime stunt. A day before his arrest, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told reporters investigators would review data from license-plate readers along Tang's route.

On Friday, it wasn't immediately clear what role the license-plate readers played in the investigation.

A dashboard-mounted camera had recorded the BMW traveling southbound on the FDR Drive from 116th Street to Battery Park and then up West Street back to 116th Street. Along the 26.4-mile loop, it stops for six red lights.

Electronic dance music provides the soundtrack in the video as a stopwatch superimposed on the screen keeps time: 24 minutes and 7 seconds. The driver claimed on tape to have broken the unofficial speed record for the same route.

The driver, using the name AfroDuck, told the car culture blog Jalopnik after the video was posted that records were meant to be broken - and that the driver wasn't identifiable from watching the 6-minute video.

"Being a fast driver doesn't mean that you're inherently a bad or reckless driver," Afroduck told Jalopnik.

–

[related]