Video led to charges for Westfield man shown driving 213 mph on I-465
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A Crime Stoppers tip, a series of YouTube videos and a Westfield man’s love of his Lamborghini led to him being charged with reckless driving after reaching speeds around 200 mph on I-465.
Gabriel Sleiman, 33, was charged Jan. 13 in Marion Superior Court 22 with driving “at an unreasonably high rate of speed” and endangering others, according to court documents.
Indiana State Police didn’t pull Sleiman over on I-465; instead, they found out from a Crime Stoppers tip about a YouTube video of him driving his Lamborghini on I-465 near the I-70 interchange on the southwest side.
Police said the video — it was uploaded Nov. 18 but no longer on the YouTube page of Bryce Thompson Media — captured the sports car’s speedometer topping 213 mph. The same video was uploaded to Facebook on Nov. 18, according to an investigation by Indiana State Police Trooper Brandon S. Fletcher.
According to court documents, Sleiman stated in the Facebook post, “Well, that’s all she has in her ..for now! Doing this naturally aspirated took quite a bit of planning, especially since I needed a good stretch on clean road to pull it off. I can’t imagine what those people I passed were thinking lol. Thanks to Bryce Thompson for putting this together. It was definitely a fun project!”
A state police reconstructionist, Detective Chris Hanson, later used the video to calculate that the black Huracán LP-610 in the video passed another vehicle on I-465 at a speed of 198 mph.
The video also showed Sleiman was driving while not wearing a seat belt. He also was talking on the phone via the car’s Bluetooth handsfree system during the drive, state police said.
The state police investigation found other YouTube videos featuring Sleiman talking about his initial involvement in street racing, his growth in his abilities as a mechanic, and what he described as an addiction to increasing the performance of vehicles and racing them, court documents said. Sleiman also talked about his Lamborghini in those videos, which described him as an Indianapolis garage owner.
The video dated Nov. 18 was removed from Bryce Thompson Media after Sleiman spoke with the state police trooper on Dec. 29. Sleiman admitted to the trooper that the Lamborghini in the video was his and said videos featuring his vehicles were “fake and deceptively edited.”
Bryce Thompson, who operates Bryce Thompson Media, later told police that he had not ridden with Sleiman in the sports car, but had set up camera to capture the drive and later edited the video as filmed, only adding some stock footage and transitions.
Asked if Sleiman drove 213 mph, Thompson told the state trooper, “As far as the footage says: Yes.”
Sleiman’s initial hearing is set for 8:30 a.m. April 30. Sleiman’s lawyer did not immediately reply to a News 8 request for comment on the case.
