Disturbing sign iconic Coachella music festival has passed its peak

Daily Mail​

30-04-2025

Once a glittering symbol of music, culture, and youthful freedom, the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival is showing troubling signs that its best days may be behind it.
The Indio Police Department has revealed how there was a sharp uptick in arrests and citations at the 2025 edition of the once-peaceful desert gathering.
It paints a grim portrait of what was once seen as the gold standard of American festivals.
According to officials, 223 arrests were made over the two-weekend event this year - a jarring 16.5 percent increase from the 193 recorded during the 2024 festival.
The charges, officials say, were a rogue's gallery of offenses that included drug and alcohol intoxication, false identification, possession of illegal drugs, and a spike in property crimes, mainly theft.
It means what was once billed as a celebration of music and art increasingly seems to be morphing into a chaotic, lawless sprawl under the California sun.
Even more unsettling is the breakdown of the figures.
During the first weekend alone, April 11-13, 22 people were arrested for being drunk.
But that figure was soon overtaken by the second weekend's explosion in drug possession cases.
During the weekend April 18-20, there were just two intoxication arrests, but drug possession arrests skyrocketed to 53, nearly doubling the 29 recorded the previous weekend.
Combined, drug possession emerged as the single most common reason for arrest across the entire event.
But the most bizarre and damning development came not from drug busts or drunken brawls, but from something even more petty - rampant abuse of handicapped parking permits in order to snag a prime parking spot.
In a sign of how desperate some festivalgoers have become to skirt the event's grueling logistics, handicapped placard violations jumped a stunning 19 percent, rising from 136 in 2024 to 162 this year.
Police enforced strict checks at the handicapped parking areas, requiring drivers to present the ID of the individual to whom the placard was issued - and that individual had to be physically present in the vehicle.
That hundreds attempted the brazen scam has somewhat tarnished the reputation of the festival that once prided itself on inclusivity and community spirit.
At its peak, Coachella represented a pilgrimage for music lovers and a place where the biggest stars, from Beyoncé to Radiohead, graced the stage under the desert sky.
The festival's capacity of 125,000 attendees each day still draws massive crowds.
But behind dazzling Instagram photos and celebrity sightings, the crime statistics suggest there is a rot setting in at the very core of the brand.