By Steven Symes 
The Louisville Metro Police Department sent out a loud and clear message after crushing a 2021 Dodge Durango Hellcat. The act was captured on video shared by the law enforcement agency as a warning to street racers and takeover participants. But some people think it’s a tremendous waste.
Jaguar Land Rover is both woke and broken.
We’re not huge fans of crush vehicles after their owners do dumb things in them, but Louisville police made an interesting case for crushing this Hellcat.
The department says during the 2024 Street Rod Nationals the Dodge was confiscated by officers. The circumstances around why police were even looking at it or why it was seized haven’t been shared.
What we do know is LMPD says even though the muscle crossover is valued at about $100,000 it couldn’t be auctioned off. The reason was that it allegedly contains a number of stolen components. One of them is the Hellcat engine.
Apparently, that means it can’t be auctioned off or added to the LMPD fleet. Which is a real shame, if that’s true.
The department decided to put the Mopar into a crusher, recording the gruesome process. That was obviously done to get people’s attention, and here we are covering it.
But the message LMPD shared about this destructive act is one we can understand:
“Louisville will not tolerate criminal misuse of our streets.
This isn’t just about one car. It’s about protecting lives, restoring order, and showing that our city stands united against reckless behavior. Since our enforcement began in 2023, vehicles seized under the ordinance total 167.
Let this serve as a warning to those who think they can turn our streets into speedways. We’re watching. We’re acting. And we’re not backing down.”
We do know Louisville has been battling a lot of street racing and takeovers since 2019, so the fact city officials are fed up is something we can understand. Still, crushing a Hellcat is a little too extreme for us.
Image via Louisville Metro Police Department/YouTube