A pair of jet skis have been on a long distance joyride after they were stolen from their offshore moorings on Kempenfelt Bay in Barrie on Aug. 6.
On that Monday night, when vendors were packing up after Kempenfest, the watercraft were secured and anchored together off-shore, not far from the fountain out in front of Centennial Beach.
At approximately 12:30 a.m., the suspects swam out and took them, the owner believes.
“I’ve been doing my due diligence, going around and getting video footage and stuff,” Paul Spenceley, manager of the company Flyboard Barrie, told BarrieToday. “There’s only so much I can do.”
He said they had GPS trackers on the machines, which revealed to him the jet skis were transported by the suspects to Brampton.
“I found them in an international shipping warehouse,” Spenceley said. “Peel Regional police showed up, and they were going to get a search warrant but couldn’t get one in time.”
He asked police if they wanted him to stay in front of the building all night, just in case they were moved from the location.
“They were like ‘no, no, we’re going to make sure there is a unit here,’ and when I woke up in the morning the jet skis were in New York (State). They ripped the trackers out and threw them on the ground. I found them.”
Spenceley claims the thieves shipped them to New York with an international shipping company.
“I’ve been doing jet ski lessons for 10 years now, and never had any equipment stolen,” he said.
Spenceley put the GPS trackers in them, but they just cut them out.
“They were put underneath the engines, so it was probably someone who has done this before and has some kind of device to find them,” he added.
Spenceley and the company have more equipment, and they still remain open for business at the lakeshore in Barrie.
“It’s not going to stop me, but I don’t think the police are going to do much, and I don’t think anything is going to happen with it, and I don’t think they’ll ever be recovered,” he said with frustration in his voice. “I asked the police how often boats get stolen, and they said it was super rare.”
Barrie police communications co-ordinator Peter Leon told BarrieToday on Thursday there is currently an ongoing investigation into the theft and that no other details were available.
“The jet skis remain outstanding," he said.
Leon noted the watercraft were stolen sometime between 7 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 5 and 8 a.m. on Tuesday, Aug 6.
Police were advised of the missing jet skis at 5:10 p.m.
Spenceley said the company will continue as they are when it comes to security, utilizing GPS units as they have trackers in their other jet skis, but will be adding surveillance cameras to the mix.
