RIALTO - Charles Hoang shook his head and paced as he watched window glass cascade to the ground, tires burst and metal crumple. The 18-year-old Chino man wasn't watching his own vehicle being crushed into a brick of scrap metal, but he knew it would soon be his car's turn.
"I want to cry right now," he said. Hoang's 1998 Acura Integra GSR was seized by Ontario police several months ago when he was caught street racing along Airport Drive. On Wednesday, police destroyed the car he spent a year and thousands of dollars building from the ground up.
He was one of six people whose vehicles were crushed at Ecology Auto Parts in Rialto through the area's San Bernardino County Regional Street Racing Task Force.
It's an operation run by numerous law enforcement agencies including the California Highway Patrol, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, as well as the Fontana, Chino, Upland, Ontario Airport and Montclair police departments.
Police are able to destroy the vehicles through court orders.
Ontario police say the program has reduced the number of street racers coming to the area by 80 percent in the past two years. Fatal and injury crashes caused by street racing have also declined, police said.
Five of the vehicles were seized not because their owners were street racing, but because they contained stolen engines and transmissions, police said.
Daniel Maldonado snapped digital photos as he watched his black 1992 Honda Civic being crushed.
"It's my life in there," he said. "That's all my money. That's all I've worked for."
His transmission didn't have an identification number. Police said it had been stolen. But Maldonado said he didn't know that and that older Japanese cars have ID stickers that can fall off.
Ontario police Cpl. Jeff Higbee said that's not possible.
Older Japanese cars bought in Japan and brought to the United States may have that problem, but American manufacturers affix mylar stickers to Japanese car parts.
"If they're not there, they've been removed by the owner," he said.
Ontario police pulled over Sergio Zavala in Ontario last year for a burned-out headlight. When officers popped open the hood of his 1993 Honda Civic, they also saw an engine with no identification number.
He later replaced that engine, but the new one also had no ID number on it. He said he didn't have the time or money to go shopping around for an engine.
But having his car seized was enough of a reality check.
"In the end, it's not worth it," he said.
Some of the vehicle owners lost a lot more than their wheels.
After Hoang's car was seized, he got fired from his job because no one would give him a ride to work. He was kicked out of school because the long walk made him late too many times, he said.
But he has plans to start over on a new car. This time, he says he doesn't plan to race unless he's on a legal track.
"It was worth it," he said. "I have no regrets. I'll live and learn."
