WASHINGTON — Columbia Heights neighbors are searching for the driver of a car that smashed into three of theirs Sunday night.
As some started digging into the license plate history, they discovered that it was tied to $1,000s in unpaid tickets.
The neighbor whose car took the initial impact is Alan. He asked that we not share his last name to protect his privacy.
His doorbell camera caught one angle of the crash.
He said it happened around 8:55 p.m. Sunday night, while he was sitting in his living room.
"Just heard a loud smash, and I figured somebody got rear-ended on Columbia Road," Alan said. "[Then] I saw it, my car got smashed, and I saw the car was still in the sort of in the process of just like ramming into my car."
He ran outside to catch the license plate number, which he did -- and then searched on the DMV's site.
“It was about what I was expecting to be honest with you," he said.
The search reveals more than $4,000 in unpaid tickets, most of them for speeding.
Alan blames the DC Council for being lax in enforcement.
WUSA 9 reached out to his councilmember, Brianne Nadeau, who now also chairs the committee that oversees the Department of Public Works.
She sent this statement:
“Reckless driving is a public safety concern, and as a result, there is a much greater focus on getting these drivers off the street now than ever before.
I’ve worked closely with DPW in these situations to get vehicles off the street, and our residents have been playing a crucial role as well. As the new chair of the Council committee with oversight of DPW, this is the very first thing I raised with the acting DPW director. The committee and I will be diving deeper into this issue."
Alan offered another idea.
“Get some booting crews out here so that these these repeat violators get booted," he said. "I think if you take the amount of boots that the city has and multiply it by about 100, that's about where we should be in terms of how many boots are going around the city... So if we did, I don't think my car would have been hit by this car."
Alan said he did file a police report on this.
They're searching for a black 2015 Kia Optima (DC GM-3489). Anyone with tips on its whereabouts should call 202-727-9099.