WATCH: Man Arrested After Taking the Notorious White Ford Bronco for a Wild Joyride on MLB Field
The Major League Baseball season is still trapped by a lockout, but that didn’t stop San Diego’s Petco Park from receiving a ton of action on its field recently.
A man was arrested Friday morning after he barged through Petco Park and took his SUV for a joyride on the baseball field, complete with a few vandalizing donuts. The driver entered the field with his truck through a left field tunnel. According to stadium staffer Ryan Carlson, workers assumed the driver was a member of the grounds crew until he began tearing up the field, which was covered in dirt.
A man is in police custody after he took a joyride on the Petco Park field in San Diego. The park was in the process of being converted back to a baseball field from a previous event. The man was arrested on felony vandalism charges and possibly trespassing. 📹: Ryan Carlson pic.twitter.com/lI8ivUJotB
— Malik Earnest (@MalikEarnest) February 20, 2022
“And then he just whips out and starts doing doughnuts,” Carlson told the San Diego Union-Tribune. “After about a minute, he came to a stop, and a bunch of the grounds crew guys made their way to the car and did like a citizens’ arrest.”
As the driver did his donuts, one worker blocked the lone exit with a forklift. Once the workers removed the driver from his SUV, police arrived and charged him with felony vandalism as well as trespassing. The Union-Tribune reported the arrest happened “peacefully.”
Despite the damage, grounds crew members will have time to get the field back in shape. Petco Park is currently scheduled to host the San Diego Padres’ 2022 home opener against the San Francisco Giants on March 31, but the current lockout is putting a timely start to the MLB season in doubt.
Ironically, the driver tore up San Diego’s baseball field with his white Ford Bronco, a vehicle notorious for Southern California joyrides after a truck of the same color and model name became the center of O.J. Simpson’s legal trouble in 1994.
