The BMW-driving speed fiend who claimed a record-setting lap of Manhattan on YouTube boasted of even crazier car exploits to the cops who arrested him, authorities said on Friday.
Adam Tang, 30, of Harlem admitted to investigators that he filmed and posted a dashboard video documenting his mad run around Manhattan, and said he once covered 4,000 miles in 38 hours, “which means driving over 100 miles an hour consistently for the entire trip,”: “a prosecutor, Assistant Manhattan District Attorney Shilpa Kalra, told a judge on Friday.
“This is not the defendant’s first violation,” Kalra said, adding, “He does not seem to feel he’s required to abide by the laws governing the roads.”
Tang appeared in court sporting facial hair, and wearing the same baggy shorts and Jack Daniels logo t-shirt he had on when police arrested him on Thursday night.
He was arraigned on two misdemeanor counts, one each of reckless driving and reckless endangerment. Kalra said her office might seek a felony grand jury indictment of Tang. Judge Joanne Quinones ordered Tang’s driver’s license suspended and demanded that Tang, a Canadian national, surrender his passport.
Quinones denied a request by Tang’s public defender, Vanessa Macias, that he be released on his own recognizance, and set bail at $10,000. Quinones made no ruling on Kalra’s argument that Tang isn’t poor enough to qualify for legal aid.
“He informed our office that he made enough day trading that he doesn’t need to do anything else for support,” Kalra said.
The portrait that emerged of Tang in court was at odds with his couch-casual attire: a graduate of Canada’s University of British Columbia who majored in economics, worked as a legal assistant, moved to New York City two years ago, and whose wife works as an educator at the Whitney Museum.
Not to mention the blue 2006 BMW Z4 roadster with Canadian plates that cops also seized on Thursday, two days after Police Commissioner Ray Kelly had promised to nab the anonymous scofflaw.
A smiling Tang, told reporters on Thursday night, “I’ll comment later” as he was frog-marched in cuffs and stuffed into a cop car for a slower ride into custody. He said nothing at his arraignment.
Tang went online last week to claim his mad Manhattan circuit of 26.5 miles in 24 minutes and 7 seconds – for an average speed of 66 mph on an improvised route with posted limits of 35-50 mph.
A time-compressed dashboard video of the stunt surfaced on YouTube on Aug. 28 under an account called “AfroDuck Production.” The post, entitled “Fastest Lap Around Manhattan 2013,” claimed the record-setting run happened on the night of Aug. 26.
AfroDuck also boasted of his anonymity to the car-geek Web site, Jalopnik: “You frankly can’t identify who I am by just looking at the video.”
But police have the ability to track and identify motorists after the fact, Kelly said Tuesday, and Tang was arrested after NYPD’s Highway District Collision Investigation Squad reviewed the video.
The video, still posted, has netted more than 363,000 views as of Friday afternoon. In the video’s comments section, and on Twitter, tongue-in-cheek cries of “Free AfroDuck!” were multiplying, along with arguments over how solid a case authorities have against the alleged speedster.