Want Your Dirt Bike Back? Talk To A Cop

Busted dirt bikers will face a higher hurdle to getting their wheels back after the cops take them, thanks to a new policy.

Lt. Jeff Hoffman this week informed neighborhood-level cops this week of the new tactic aimed at cracking down on New Haven’s dirt bike menace.

When people are caught riding the bikes illegally on city streets, the bikes will be towed. The owners will have to prove to a cop — not just to the towing company — that they own the bikes before they can get them back.

That strategy has ​“delayed or prevented the return of vehicles in the past,” Hoffman wrote in an email this week.

East Rock Alderman Justin Elicker welcomed the development, but said it doesn’t go far enough. At any rate, it’s a placeholder policy until stronger anti-dirt-biking laws can be created, he said.

The new police policy is the latest development in the city’s ongoing efforts to prevent people from riding dirt bikes on city streets. Throughout this summer — and summers past — dirt bikers have screamed around the city, doing wheelies and flouting traffic laws, in one case hitting a 7‑year-old girl standing with her father on a sidewalk at a bus stop. Neighbors have lodged numerous complaints, but the police have had trouble catching the scofflaws, due to the police department’s no-chase policy.

Dirt bikers who are caught receive tickets. (Click here to read about one rider, pictured in the photo at the top of the story, who ended up paying a $75 court fine.) Unless there is a more serious crime involved, their bikes are towed away, not impounded. The bikes are retrievable from the towing company for a fee of about $80 plus daily storage costs, and proof of ownership.

Recently, the city has begun looking into what laws it has — or could make — to assist police in stopping dirt bikers. The city’s corporation counsel revealed at a meeting this month that cops would be within their rights to impound recovered dirt bikes instead of having companies tow them to private lots. This would make it hard for dirt bikers to retrieve the bikes.

But the police department has decided not to exercise that option, according to Hoffman. It would amount to free storage for the dirt bike owner until a judge orders the bike returned, and the police department doesn’t have the storage space or staff to start such a system, Hoffman wrote.

Instead, cops will start giving the tow companies written instructions not to return dirt bikes ​“until a police officer verifies owner paperwork.”

District managers will be the point people for this sign-off. The dirt-bike owner will have to contact police. The district manager will then assign a cop to meet the purported owner at the towing company and verify his paperwork.

“It adds a level of scrutiny that wasn’t there before,” Hoffman said. ​“We want to make sure that the tow companies are not releasing unregistered bikes to people that don’t own them.” Usually dirt bikers who are caught don’t own the bikes they’re riding, Hoffman said.

The new policy will also give cops another chance to have a face to face meeting with a dirt biker, and maybe the rider’s parents. ​“They may get a second talking-to,” Hoffman said.

What’s more, the dirt biker won’t be able to ride his bike out of the lot. He’ll have to walk it home or have a truck pick it up, Hoffman said.

Elicker said he is disappointed the cops didn’t go for an impounding option, discussed earlier this month, that would force riders to appear in court. ​“The logistical issues can be overcome,” he said.

Another concern: ​“I don’t trust the tow companies to follow the procedures given to them by the police department,” he said. What options do police have to ensure towing companies follow the new policy? he asked.

Hoffman said the tow companies that don’t comply with the new procedure could be removed from the city’s towing contract list: ​“I think there’s some incentive to follow the rules.”

The bigger goal, Elicker said, is working on making laws at the state level to give cops more tools to go after dirt bikers. Now’s the time, as the dirt-biking season comes to a close, Elicker said. That way the cops can collect the bikes on the first nice spring day they come out and hold onto them.

Elicker said the city’s corporation counsel’s office is working with New Haven state Rep. Roland Lemar on several possible changes to state statutes, including increasing fines for illegal dirt biking and for holding seized bikes and ATVs.