Crown Rick Auto

dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
This isn't necessarily lightbar related, so I figured the off-topic lounge would be the place to post this.

I often times cruise YouTube looking at lightbar videos and police vehicle videos. I am NOT LEO. I've never pretended to be LEO. However, I'm an avid LEO supporter. Among my lightbar collection, I also have a police patch and badge collection. One night, I was cruising YouTube, and I came across a video from a guy who calls himself Crown Rick, and he has a shop, or a car lot, or something related, named Crown Rick Auto. From what I can tell off some interwebs research, his shop is in Sacramento.

I was wondering if anybody had ever heard from this guy. From what I can tell, he purchases retired and wrecked CVPI in California and resells them. That said, he also appears to tear through them and is constantly looking for contraband that's been hidden in the back of these police cruisers. His videos are crazy. Often times he destroys the police cars, tearing through them, ripping all the police equipment out of them and giving away handcuffs and other things he finds in the cars to his followers on social media.

Apparently, he also fixes up some of the former police cars to look like in-service police cars. He'll often times dress up in tactical gear and drive around at a high rate of speed, waving around tasers and pretending to arrest his friends. He also uses police band radios to communicate with his friends while they're off on their shenanigans. He has also taken videos of himself with real marked in-service cars. How he gets his hands on something like that is beyond me.

He's apparently gotten in trouble with his neighbor, causing the neighbor to call the police on him dozens of times. His landlord has recently evicted Crown Rick from the shop, and he claims to be moving on to a bigger and better shop where he'll be blasting his sirens, burning rubber, and making more videos of his messing around.

I was just curious if anybody on the board had ever heard of this guy. If there were ever a Whacker of the Year award, this guy would be a multiple winner of the award.
 

Doyle257

Member
Jan 13, 2015
658
Cheektowaga, NY
we need to see the youtubes link, so we can judge for ourselves the Whackerisim
 

Doyle257

Member
Jan 13, 2015
658
Cheektowaga, NY
...Im at a loss for words...this isnt even dinger...this is full on blownut....
 

unlisted

Lifetime VIP Donor
May 20, 2010
7,333
NA
Whisky Tango Foxtrot ...

Only saving grace.. the car running "code" through the streets is not the same one they are showing off..

Also.. whats the term for someone who has gone beyond whacker stage? (besides arrested?)
 

Station 3

Member
May 21, 2010
3,395
Edinburg Texas
Im one of his youtube subscribers... he is in a never ending search for a gun.. so far no gun but plenty of other used lights,sirens,tazers,bullets and such.. guy is a whacker for sure. And he has a rather large following 381,956 subscribers so.. he gets about .10 cents per 10,000 views if he is a youtube partner so he makes decent money from youtube ad sense.
 

Evtech161

New Member
Nov 9, 2016
157
Woburn
I really don't know what to say.......... the fact he hasn't been arrested for impersonating, is beyond me. its nuts like that, that give real shops a bad name. its one thing to restore cars, its another to do what this nut is doing. I hope his arrest is caught on video.
 

firebuff17

Member
Mar 28, 2011
774
CT
I happened upon his eBay account while searching for Lightbar's and lightheads.
I don't remember off the top of my head how his pricing was.
But has anyone bought from his eBay listings? If you have, please post how the transaction was. Would you reccomend buying from him?
 

dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
The thing is, I'm sure he would make plenty of money selling all the stuff he takes off the cars. I'm sure he makes decent money from his ridiculous videos, but I'm also sure he could make his videos without dressing up like a police officer and acting a fool. I would love to have a shop where I would recondition old Crown Vics and where I would get mountains of used emergency equipment. But like I've said before, I have never pretended to be a cop, and I wouldn't drive around in a car with flashing lights and sirens.

Just like people who take vehicles and dress them up to look like police cars. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
 
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dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
I mean, there are videos where he just completely destroys most of the police cars that he runs across. I don't even see the point in making those. There's a video where he literally tears up the whole rear end of a CV because he was trying to get into the trunk to get in the car because he locked the keys inside, when he had plenty of car doors where he could have replaced the broken window instead. Why buy a car if you're just going to tear it up for no good reason? And it appears as if he doesn't even have the basic understanding of what a lot of the leftover emergency equipment is. Just a weird situation all around.
 
I'm amazed he hasnt been done by local Law Enforcement for POCS or PODP with the amount of stuff he finds in the body work. I wouldn't be surprised if he gets some income off those items too.
 
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Phoenix_Rising

Lifetime VIP Donor
Feb 27, 2012
6,742
Berks County PA
ya’ll dont remember him???? he was a member he before we laughed him out of town. wasnt he the one with the rhino-lined vic saying he was selling everything cause he was going in the military to finally be a real boy or some shit?

i gotta hunt now and find his name here
 
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Station 3

Member
May 21, 2010
3,395
Edinburg Texas
His newest video... is just magic he shoots at a unit with shot gun rounds he found in the trunk.
 

dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
In one of his videos he claims he was "almost arrested" because he was doing burnouts in one of his cars while laying on the air horn and siren. He then claims he was on a "private driveway."

He could be doing fairly well recycling the emergency equipment that he finds in the cars and reselling it to first responders with POV that need the stuff, and he could be doing just fine refurbishing and reselling the decent CVs he picks up, but he has to go nuts with those videos and trashing some of the cars he gets. Sad.
 

CrownVic97

Member
May 21, 2010
3,350
Hazen, ND
The big question for me is that how can some departments just auction off vehicles that still have the emergency equipment installed, but disconnected, to a private individual such as this Rick dude? I've stumbled upon his videos from time to time and seen full size lightbars, siren consoles, and 2-way radios left with the vehicle. I can get that leaving the amber stuff wouldn't be much of an issue, but red/blue lights? Anybody with a bit of vehicle electrical knowledge and doing some internet research could easily get power back to that equipment and use it for whatever. Isn't there laws in Kommiefornia that strictly prohibit these things at public auctions?

Oh, and Rick and his 391,000 followers can keep dreaming about finding a real firearm in a car, because if that does happen, the CHP will be knocking at Rick's door and whatever department that had that car is gonna be in a world of $#%T. You'd think in the videos, one where this guy finds the riot shotgun rounds or the other where he found a Taser, that the department that sold the car would have done a much better job making sure NO live ammo of any type or less-lethal weapons would make it into a private citizen's possession. If I was in charge of stripping a cruiser and find out that police-only items (or even knives and drug crap that he finds sometimes) like that were now on some guy's YouTube channel for the world to see, I'd be physically sick 'cause now MY ass is gonna be in for it.

Videos in question:
 

dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
It's bad enough that he's supposedly found drugs during his vehicle teardowns. I'd figure someone would be knocking on his door for that alone.
 
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dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
Oh, and I love the comment on his shotgun ammo find video. If he gets a certain amount of likes, he's going to shoot his friend with one of the beanbag rounds.

With friends like those, who needs enemies?
 

dg0223

Member
Feb 20, 2011
703
USA/Texas
Why are you under the impression that some of these cars are coming from Mexico?

Most, if not all, of them seem to be coming from police departments in California. He sometimes mentions the departments when he's going through the cars. Most of the crap left inside comes from US police departments.

Most police vehicles go from the United States to Mexico, not the other way around.
 
It's a good question, and was just me thinking aloud really. Although one or two may have come back across the border and ended up in his err..."cave of crown vics"

Frankly, I think someone needs to go a knocking with a warrant
 

Dave-O

Member
Jun 11, 2010
200
Florida, USA
I'm pretty sure the "finds" are fake. I worked on the same beat where our city garage was located and I had been called there a couple times for drugs found in the decommissioned cars. We're talking small baggies, not huge shotguns, tasers, mace guns, etc. I'm pretty sure that stuff would be found by the department prior to auction.
 

CrownVic97

Member
May 21, 2010
3,350
Hazen, ND
What one will do to get his videos watched......:rolleyes:

maxresdefault.jpg


Cool photoshop skills, brah.....o_O
 
Jun 18, 2013
3,709
PA
wtf is that?

Seriously?
 
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1863650

Member
Jun 2, 2014
111
Colorado
There's a difference between a troll and a clown. While he seems to hang-out with some whackers who border on impersonators, for his channel, it appears he's only doing goofy skits on private property with some clips of actual police dash cams & radio traffic thrown in. When he "radios" to dispatch with PA mics, it's pretty obvious that the responses are dubbed and he's likely not playing around on restricted public safety frequencies.

I don't have reason to doubt the overwhelming majority of his "finds", it's very inexpensive junk that isn't controlled. A flare gun or non-lethal Super Sock rounds (the shotgun was not from a car, but one he borrowed to shoot the bean bags) and similar things are in about the same category as old safety fusees. He also usually says something when he "finds" a planted item like an Airsoft gun one of his buddies leaves for him to discover.

It's also pretty clear how sloppy a lot of departments in his region are when it comes to decommissioning. The fleets for some of those agencies are huge, their staff don't seem to put a whole lot of effort into stripping the vehicles. More than likely, they sit out in back of the motorpool for a few months, someone paints over or removes the decals, and a wrecker takes them to auction. It's probably more expensive to go through the effort of removing vintage Touchmaster controllers and obsolete Motorola radios than just let them go to the crusher with the car, which is likely where the majority of those old CVPIs end up. Same goes for going through the car looking for stuff. They're almost certainly not going to miss anything which requires accountability, such as a firearm, but the peripheral equipment which isn't going to be a huge embarrassment if it wanders off is just not worth the trouble.

Crown Rick videos are usually clickbait, but can be entertaining at times. He's a silly man who buys cheap junk cars & assaults plush toys for Youtube views (and $$$), that seems to be about the extent of it.
 

Jarred J.

Lifetime VIP Donor
May 21, 2010
11,580
Shelbyville, TN
Uhhhh yea...
 

Evtech161

New Member
Nov 9, 2016
157
Woburn
In all my years, I’ve never seen a more wreckless and careless handling of a weapon.... blanks or not, this is the reason why gun control advocates are pushing like crazy to make stronger laws! It’s also one more reason to support my theory. Guns don’t kill, stupid people with them do!! This clown is a disgrace
 

CrownVic97

Member
May 21, 2010
3,350
Hazen, ND

1863650

Member
Jun 2, 2014
111
Colorado
That one was pretty cringeworthy. I was taught to handle even toy guns as if they were real & loaded. There was just an EMT killed by another EMT while they were horsing-around shooting each other with an Airsoft, one mixed-up his real gun with the toy and shot his partner.
 

Nolines

Member
Apr 5, 2018
1,678
Margate, FL
I myself remember finding a clip to a 9 mm gun in a used car when I worked at a dealership, but the best find was a majors badge from a Miami Dept in my mom's explorer, never was able to get it to the major, it's sitting in my radio stuff. Lol
 

BLUELIGHT

Member
Jul 7, 2018
118
Hendersonville NC
I've seen some apparently good serviceable stuff he has found on/in the cars. Stuff the taxpayers paid good money for, that the user of the car was too lazy to thoroughly look for before turning the car in and will have to be replaced at taxpayer expense. No wonder the whole state is going bankrupt.
 

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