Trespassing WTC BASE jumper

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Trespassing WTC BASE jumper only regrets getting caught

By Antonio Antenucci, Josh Saul and Bob Fredericks
March 24, 2014 | 10:15am




The top of 1 World Trade Center and its spire Photo: AFP/Getty Images



One of the BASE jumpers who leapt from the Freedom Tower in September said on Monday his only regret was getting caught.
“The intent was for nobody to ever find out and for nobody to get hurt and nobody did get hurt. I’m just trying not to go to jail,” said Andrew Rossig, who has been told to surrender this afternoon to the NYPD along with his three pals for the Sept. 30 leap.
“We knew what we were getting into when we did it,” Rossig said.
While authorities had initially instructed Rossig, fellow jumpers Marco Markovich and James Brady, and lookout Kyle Hartwell to turn themselves in Thursday, the NYPD called Rossig defense attorney Tim Parlatore on Monday afternoon to demand the men turn themselves in by 5 p.m.
“We’ll go straight down to the First Precinct,” Parlatore said, adding that the men will likely face burglary and trespassing charges.
The trio of BASE jumpers may have snuck through the same hole in a fence that a New Jersey teen squeezed through to get to the top of the WTC.
“They are accused of sneaking into the World Trade Center, going through quite possibly the same hole in the fence that this kid climbed through last week that they never fixed, going to the top and parachuting off,” said Parlatore, referring to Justin Casquejo, the New Jersey teen who snuck onto the WTC site on March 16.
The 16-year-old was able to avoid security — including a sleeping guard — as he made his way to the top of the world’s biggest terror target undetected, a story first reported by the Post.




Justin Alexander Casquejo allegedly slipped past four layers of WTC security and spent two hours atop the tallest building in the United States, until he was finally discovered by a construction worker.


“They walked up — they didn’t get a ride up like that kid,” Parlatore said of Casquejo, who rode an elevator on his way to the top.
The shocking security breach prompted a blizzard of criticism of the Port Authority.
Parlatore said one of the jumpers had a helmet cam, and that authorities have the video evidence in their possession.
The jumpers, clad in all black and wearing dark helmets, parachuted into lower Manhattan at about 3 a.m., landing right in front of one of the world’s largest investment banks before vanishing, police said at the time.
The jumpers were captured on surveillance video after they dropped from the sky in front of the Goldman Sachs building near the World Financial Center.
Rossig, 33, of Orange County had been arrested in 2008 after BASE jumping in Bear Mountain State Park upstate.
He was also busted in 2012 for trying to jump from the top of a 33-story building at Co-op City in the Bronx.
When asked why he and his friends had chosen the World Trade Center, Rossig said, “We’re BASE jumpers, it the biggest building in the Western Hemisphere,” but added that no disrespect was meant to the victims of 9/11.
He also explained the appeal of the dangerous sport.
“For me it kind of brings back how temporary life is, we all get into our cars every day, we cross the street and we don’t think about it … It just kind of puts things into perspective for me,” Rossig said.



B.A.S.E. Jump Team Defense Fund
http://nycbasejump.com/

https://www.facebook.com/jeb.corliss/posts/10154435844470195

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The arrests came days after a New Jersey teenager was accused of unlawfully entering the site, eluding an inattentive security guard and spending about two hours atop the 1,776-foot(541.3-meter)-tall tower. The skyscraper, still under construction, crowns the rebuilt World Trade Center, a project steeped in security concerns.

621x350xJames-Brady-0326-660x371.jpg

James Brady, left, and Andrew Rossig, right, two parachutists who jumped from One World Trader Center in September 2013, are accompanied by attorney Timothy Parlatore to surrender to police, in New York, Monday, March 24, 2014. Monday’s arrests come eight days after a 16-year-old was arrested on charges of climbing up to the top of the nation’s biggest skyscraper. Police had no immediate information on Monday’s arrests. They had said they were looking for two parachutists seen floating near the building Sept. 30. The defense attorneys say three accused jumpers and an alleged accomplice on the ground are expecting to face felony burglary charges. The attorneys say the defendants are experienced BASE jumpers, the acronym stands for “building, span, antenna, earth.” The lawyers say the men took care to keep from endangering anyone. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

The New York Police Department said last fall that investigators were looking for two parachutists in dark jumpsuits seen floating near the building around 3 a.m. on Sept. 30, landing by a nearby skyscraper and walking away.

It was “very exhilarating,” one of the accused jumpers, Andrew Rossig, said Monday as he and co-defendant James Brady headed to a police precinct to surrender.

“It’s a fair amount of free-fall time,” he said. “You really get to enjoy the view of the city and see it from a different perspective.”

Rossig, an avid BASE jumper — the acronym stands for “building, antenna, span, earth” — said the skydivers took care to keep from endangering anyone, choosing a time when streets would be largely deserted. Brady, an ironworker who formerly worked at the trade center, declined to comment.

It wasn’t immediately clear how investigators zeroed in on them. Police searched their homes last month and got video of the jump, which hadn’t been posted online or otherwise publicized, Rossig attorney Timothy Parlatore said. But he said authorities didn’t signal arrests were imminent until 16-year-old Justin Casquejo’s arrest last week.

The NYPD devotes more than 200 officers, surveillance cameras and other technology to protect the perimeter of the site, while Port Authority police and private security agents guard the inside. Ultimately, plans call for a $40 million system of barriers and checkpoints around the 16-acre(6.48-hectare) trade center site.

But Rossig said the jumpers got in simply by walking through a gap in a fence, echoing an account the Port Authority says Casquejo gave police about what he did. Casquejo faces a misdemeanor trespassing charge.

B.A.S.E. Jump Team Defense Fund
http://nycbasejump.com/

https://www.facebook.com/jeb.corliss/posts/10154435844470195