When 18-year-old Damarion Spann spotted an Instagram flier advertising a massive beach gathering near downtown Chicago, he didn’t think twice — he wanted in. That night, thousands of young people flooded the shoreline, filling the air with music and dancing.
What Spann experienced is part of a broader phenomenon sweeping the nation: so-called teen takeovers. These large, often spontaneous gatherings are organized through social media, hyped online, and frequently captured on video. While many participants simply want to have fun, the events have also been linked to shootings, theft, and property destruction — raising alarms among city officials and law enforcement heading into the summer months.
Over the July 4th holiday weekend, Raleigh, North Carolina saw several thousand young people converge on two separate locations. Police reported that nine people were shot and wounded, including one adult who had no connection to the gatherings.
Similar incidents unfolded in Pensacola, Florida, where a 19-year-old was fatally shot, and in Newport Beach, California, where police arrested more than 400 people after the police chief reported that teens fired “explosive mortars and other projectiles” at officers who were trying to disperse the crowd.
But teens like Spann argue that these events are being widely misunderstood. They point to curfews and group-size restrictions at malls and movie theaters that have increasingly limited where young people can gather. Many trace a growing sense of disconnection back to the isolation of remote learning during the coronavirus pandemic.
Across the country, communities and police departments are working to identify event organizers, hold parents financially accountable, and implement curfews to get ahead of future gatherings.
In Detroit, officials say they have successfully “thwarted” 19 planned gatherings so far this year by tracking social media posts to monitor shifting times and locations. Teferi Brent, director of the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood and Community Safety, described the effort as proactive surveillance.
“We have eyes on all the behaviors and activities of those who have expressed interest in trying to take over and we have done a good job of being way ahead of the curve and being able to prevent a lot of these things,” Brent said.
In Chicago, Alderperson Jessie Fuentes, who chairs the City Council’s subcommittee on Youth Employment, said her office has been searching for solutions that go beyond policing — working with parents and community members to defuse tensions before they escalate.
Blue Island, a suburb south of Chicago, has gone a different route: fining parents or guardians of teens involved in takeovers and using that money to pay for cleanup costs, including debris removal and damage like dented cars that teens climbed over while running from police.
Florida officials have taken one of the toughest stances, with state prosecutors empowered to apply racketeering laws — tools typically reserved for criminal gangs and organized crime — if a teen takeover appears to be coordinated by what they describe as “an organized network.”
Not everyone agrees that the threat of serious legal consequences will actually stop these gatherings. Melissa Milchman, executive director of the nonpartisan Coalition for Juvenile Justice, said the research simply doesn’t support that idea.
“What we know about adolescent brain development is that the stakes are not going to be what prevents a young person from engaging in risky behavior,” Milchman said. She also warned that mass arrests tend to sweep up teens who were there for innocent reasons while doing little to stop those actually breaking the law.
For Spann, the media coverage surrounding teen takeovers has largely missed the point of why young people show up in the first place.
“You feel like a young person who has freedom, who’s not being held to something,” said Spann, who is Black. At the Chicago beach event, he was able to reconnect with people he hadn’t seen since 8th grade.
He said the takeovers are a direct consequence of years of school closures in Black neighborhoods across Chicago. Even basketball courts — once a place for teens to gather — have had their nets removed by officials trying to prevent fights. Spann noted that his mother, who grew up in the same neighborhood, often talks about how much easier it once was to spend time outside without the constant fear of gun violence.
When Spann visits malls in wealthier parts of the city with his mostly Black group of friends, he says shoppers stare and security guards confront them. To avoid being questioned, he and his friends sometimes split up and enter outdoor shopping areas in smaller groups at different times.
“If I’m with my white friends, I feel like I belong,” Spann said, describing the contrast in how he’s treated in those same spaces.
Despite the real risks — physical danger, fines, or arrest — the pull of these gatherings remains powerful, according to Jeffrey Bernstein, a psychologist and author.
“The kids still do it because they feel like it’s their second family,” Bernstein said, adding that peer connection “really takes over as their primary sense of connection.” He noted, “They’re getting things from their peers that they can’t get from their parents.”
Some cities have responded not with crackdowns, but with alternatives. In St. Louis, officers have begun taking some teens to community centers rather than jail so their parents can pick them up. In Baltimore, officials have leaned on public schools to offer alternative programming. In Chicago, Spann himself received an $11,000 grant from the city and partner nonprofits to organize an end-of-summer event for his peers — giving his community one more place to come together.
In Detroit, 16-year-old Daveion Page was bored one April afternoon and turned to social media, posting a promotion for a teen takeover. Hundreds of teens showed up downtown, and by the end of the night, fights had broken out. At a separate takeover the following month, a 14-year-old was shot and wounded.
After the April event, Page spoke to reporters and said he never intended for things to turn violent. “I just wanted to get out of the house, have fun, enjoy time with my family and my homeboys and my homegirls, too,” said Page, who appeared alongside Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield and other city officials at a news conference.
Page told city leaders that young people would respond positively if more safe gathering spots were made available to them.
Detroit had already earmarked $1.5 million from its city budget for summer programming and violence prevention before the takeovers began. In the wake of the events, the city launched a new office of youth affairs, sent officials to listen to students at schools, and established a youth advisory board made up of teens and young adults.
“We have brought them to the table and made them a part of our structure in regards to identifying what the needs and concerns are of the young people in the city,” Brent said.
One of the most visible new offerings in Detroit is a late-night basketball league, created specifically as an alternative for teens and young adults looking for something to do. The city provides jerseys and sneakers to participants.
“This league just helps me find something to do,” said Cameron Chandler, 21, during a recent game at a recreation center.
Chandler said he has never taken part in a takeover, but recently stumbled onto one near his home after basketball practice. “There were a lot of cops and some people got arrested,” he said. “You just have to think, ‘that could easily be me.’”
