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Men stopped from parachuting off Ind. cell tower
Published - Aug 11 2010 02:14PM EST

BARGERSVILLE, Ind. — Police said two men climbed a central Indiana cell phone tower with plans to parachute from it before they were stopped by a sheriff's deputy. The Johnson County Sheriff's Department said the two men were spotted going over the fence surrounding the tower Sunday night and then starting to scale it. Police were called to the site near Bargersville, and the men climbed down after a deputy shone a spotlight on them.

Both men were wearing parachutes and told the deputy that they had planned to jump from the tower. The men, ages 26 and 32, were arrested on preliminary misdemeanor trespassing charges.

Trespassing is trespassing, I would have jumped down. Unless it was someplace like NPS territory, then it's a whole diff game.

Give the cop a show in that case

My defense would be that if was safer to jump down than climb down.

Climb down or Jump?

That is a tough decision. If I knew the cops were going to penalize me the same either way then I would def jump, but I have a feeling that the average cop would give you the highest fine possible and try to find every other violation he could if you jumped after he told you to climb down. I think I'd be more likely to jump anyhow if it was an opening vs a tower I had already jumped a few times. Whether or not I was already at the top and ready to jump would also play a factor. I think I'll just stick with not getting caught for now though.

A friend of mine said it best one day about a third of the way up a tower when a farmer came out and was eyeing us, "I'm not going to jail with a packed rig, guy". I agreed.

hahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahaha

If you continue to climb after told not to, they can get your for evading and resisting arrest and failure to comply...

Yeah, I guess it all depends on the circumstances. How far from the top I am, what the cops are telling me. Im not going to disobey if they tell me not to jump but if they shine the light on me and Im close to the top and they don't say anything, Ill probably jump. Might as well. Although they might charge you with reckless endangerment since theres people below.

To: Zach / hikeat

Your reply is a little funny to me because you and I
got caught in a similar situation and remember what
I said, "Fuck it, they saw us, if this tower is burned
I want my last jump from her, alright let's jump!".

Which turned out really well since that is when I met
the owner of the land surrounding Wanda and was
able to shake his hand and get his permission.

To: Bill / SpeedPhreak

I hate to agree with Kiki32, but yeah it depends...

During the day you would be able to see the cop car.
At night a bright light could be anyone. If they are
using a bull horn or PA system then no dice but if
they were just yelling then I would just not be able
to hear them and think a 3rd year law student could
successfully argue that charge away.

So, 'fess up; Tod? Max? Was it you guys?

From what I heard it was not those guys.

Nope, way to sly......or more likely we don't jump enough

Neither one of those guys jump very much. Id be suprised if they have 30 jumps between the both of them. they said the cop told them he would have charged them with criminal mischief if they had jumped. Only way i see he could have charged them with that is if they landed in the corn field.