SOUTH BAY : Police Drag-Racers Give Teens Crash Course on Safety

It’s not a pretty sight. The hollow black shell of a 1984 Mustang sits idle in a Carson warehouse, engine parts strewn about and discarded tires stacked in what once was the front seat.

But by the time Hawthorne Police Officer Robert Musulin and the department’s Blue Heat drag-racing team are finished, the car will be transformed into a black, white and deep blue racing machine complete with a 351 Windsor custom engine, police lights and siren, and a Turbo 400 transmission.

Musulin’s mission is to conquer a quarter mile in 10 seconds (90 m.p.h., without crashing) on a racetrack while teaching students from around the South Bay the dangers of street racing, drugs and drunk driving.

“We’re teaching responsibility . . . and (trying) to present that racing should be done in a safe manner at the track and not on the street,” Musulin said. “We use the cars as carrots to lure the kids in and open up communication with them.”

If all goes well, Musulin and his four-officer crew will soon be touring school assemblies from Wilmington to Redondo Beach, showing off the Mustang and a soon-to-be-rebuilt 1967 Camaro along with the blood-spattered, twisted remains of a car that was involved in a drunk-driving crash.

Musulin hopes the graphic display will grab the teen-agers’ attention while officers tell the all-too-familiar tragic stories about drinking, driving and street racing gone awry. He cites a drag-racing accident around Christmas last year in which two teen-agers were killed and a case of beer was found in the car.

“We could talk for an hour, but if we get their attention (using the cars) for 20 seconds, there’s no telling how many lives we might save,” he said.

School assemblies are not the only place the Blue Heat will appear. Musulin plans to have the Mustang ready later this summer to race against other law enforcement racing teams at speedways throughout Southern California.

Supporters say that once the program is up and running, it will be a godsend for law enforcement and teen-agers alike.

“Kids are going to go fast anyway,” said Juvenile Traffic Hearing Officer Jerry L. Dick.

But Dick says the program will teach youths the advantages of organized racing on a closed track like the Brotherhood Speedway on Terminal Island.

For a small fee, the Brotherhood Speedway allows would-be street racers to show off their skills without endangering the public, Dick said.