Viral Splish Splash BMX video leads to police investigation
A professional BMX rider and several of his friends could be facing trespassing charges after they spent Thanksgiving morning riding the slides at Splish Splash water park in Calverton.
Billy Perry, a 21-year-old rider from West Islip who has a large social media following, posted a video of his “crazy adventure” on his YouTube account, where it had already received more than 2.2 million views as of Wednesday morning from BMX enthusiasts across the world.
“It’s one of those things you talk about and everybody talks about and everyone wants to do it and nobody ever does it and we did it,” Mr. Perry says at the end of the video. “We finally did it. It was a savage day.”
But that day may have consequences. Splish Splash staff reported the incident Monday to Riverhead police, who are investigating it as a trespassing case.
Sgt. Harry Hill said police are currently working to identify each of the suspects and are also concerned that similar incidents may occur.
“We’re conducting extra patrols in the area of Splish Splash in case of any copycats,” Sgt. Hill told the News-Review.
Park general manager Mike Bengtson declined comment, saying the investigation is in the hands of police.
Mr. Perry opens the video by detailing his crew’s plans and saying they attempted the same stunt earlier this year, but it rained that day. He says he doesn’t “want to get arrested,” though other videos on his page indicate that an occasional run-in with the law is not out of the ordinary.
The 15-minute video goes on to show the men breaking into the park and performing tricks on rides like Alien Invasion, Dragon’s Den and Max Trax.
Finally, on the Mammoth River, the riders appear to be confronted by a park employee and they head out of the park.
“That was the most savage session we’ve had in a long time,” Mr. Perry says toward the end of the video. “That was amazing. We had a good two hours in there.”
Mr. Perry, whose most watched video shows him riding through the streets of New York City and has totaled nearly four million views, did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday morning.
