Extreme Sport To Feature In 'Tri-Borough'

CSI Files

Captain
A power cut will lead Mac and Stella into the world of extreme sports in the upcoming episode "Tri-Borough" when it turns out the victim was a real-life spider-man, CSI Files sources revealed today.

In a huge city like New York, local power outages are not an infrequent occurrence, and usually don't require more police involvement than a patrol car taking an extra cruise through the neighbourhood to check everything's still peaceful. So what are Mac and Stella doing in this regular Queens neighbourhood, where all the power went down during last night's Knicks game? Unlike most power outages, this one was caused by a young man being electrocuted.

As the CSIs find that somebody tried to dispose of the body, they realise this probably wasn't an accident, and the man was murdered. Unfortunately, none of the neighbours are able to provide them with any information, and without further evidence, Mac and Stella are unable to enter any of the houses. Rather than try and find out more about the killer, they set about uncovering the identity of the victim. Eventually, they discover his name was Red Hontz, nickname 'Slick,' and last night, he was Parkouring.

Parkour is a new extreme sport that was invented in the late eighties by Frenchman <font color=yellow>David Belle</font>. Athletes who practise the sport see the city as an urban obstacle course, climbing on rooftops, jumping from building to building, and performing somersaults and flips to make their "parkour run" even more spectacular. No deaths have yet been reported among participants of the sport, known as traceurs, but bruises and broken bones are not unheard of after some of the most death-defying runs.

But for Mac and Stella, it's not the thrill that counts - it's the sport's potential for criminal abuse. When you're scaling skyscrapers and sliding down firescapes, what do you do when you see an open jewelry box behind a window on the eleventh floor? In fact, Slick's best friend, and the last person to see him alive, is a traceur with a burglarly conviction on his record. Could Slick's death have been the result of another less than legal diversion from his parkour run?

While Mac and Stella delve into the world of extreme sports, the rest of the CSI team is kept busy with two other murder cases. Danny takes along a Detective Maka to investigate the death of an art dealer who appears to have been involved with a major scam involving fake paintings. And after Mac and Danny's encounter with construction worker unions in "A Man A Mile," it's now Aiden's turn, as she is assigned to the case of a workman found dead at a construction site.

"Tri-Borough" will likely air sometime in early December. Please note that this plot information has not been confirmed by CBS or Bruckheimer TV and until such time you should treat it as you would any other rumour from an unofficial source. The details are based on an early draft of the script and aspects of the episode may change before it goes to air. If you would like to find out more about Parkours, head over to the web site of the UK Parkour Association, or to UrbanFreeflow.com.<center></center>
 
It would be a shame for Parkour to receive such a poor image on one of its first major appearances in the US.

The idea of crime is so unlike actual Parkour, or the intentions of Traceurs who practice the art.

In truth, Parkour gives people constructive goals; it is both art and discipline, similar to martial arts or gymnastics in that respect.

I would hope that if there is still time, the producer, author, or anyone interested in making a quality show (which CSI is) would look to some of the many websites out there, to see that Parkour is not used for crime, but has instead fostered a worldwide community devoid of barriers based on all of the usual prejudices which keep people apart.

Why not cast the Traceur as the witness to the crime, or the one who can catch the criminal?

I will point specifically to Urban Freeflow
which has a community nearly 5,000 members strong, including over 40 countries. In 2 years of moderating the forums, I have yet to hear a story of Parkour being used for crime, or of it having a negative impact on anyone's life.

If you hear this plea, please give our art a chance to grow and thrive. Do not misrepresent it in its infancy, making it harder for us to practice, and casting us as criminals.

Thank You,
Mark Toorock
m2rock@urbanfreeflow.com
 
I understand that it's too late to make any changes to this episode, but please realize there are a lot of traceurs who are a bit frustrated with their sport getting this kind of publicity. Really, all we want to do is have fun and feel the freedom of flowing movement and I don't think there are any serious tracuers who would descecrate our sport by using it for larceny. If some sort of disclaimer can be added to the episode, that small gesture at least would be much appreciated. Thank you very much for your time.
 
I would hope that some decent amount of research had been done about the subject of Parkour before working it into a CSI script, being that your show is always so accurate in its portrayal of real world events.

The United States is still in a state of infancy in relation to the art, and it would be a shame for it's first exposure to be associated with criminal acts of any kind. I personally feel that it would be a disservice to those of us who practice the art for the purpose of mental and physical growth and discipline resulting in perfection of movement to be cast along-side criminals.

Hopefully you will take these points into consideration, and maybe even contact myself or M2 in regards to the true nature of the discipline and its practice in the US.

Thanks

Edit: Also, keep in mind that there is a dedicated core of traceurs around the US who would be more than happy to work with you to accurately represent Parkour and its philosophies :)
 
I've been active in the Parkour community for nearly two years now, and I'm sad to see its largest U.S. media exposure to date in this light. The parkour/freerunning community is one of a very positive mindset! We don't condone crime, and shun those that do.

I understand that I really have no right criticizing this television program, but I wish to express my concern for the image of our sport. We do our best to seem positive and productive to the rest of the world, but more often than not, they just see us as potential criminals. It is somewhat disheartening to see something that we work so hard to maintain frowned upon like this.

Respectfully,

-Chris
 
Let me first start off by saying that I really think that 'CSI' is a quality show but upon hearing about and reading the description of the upcoming episode 'Tri-Borough', I must say that I am very disappointed. I am an avid traceur and have been doing the sport Parkour for a while now and have come to love it a great deal. The thing is, we as traceurs already get enough crap from people misinterpreting our sport, to have such a popular show spreading the word that ,the sport we try so hard to shed a positive light on, has criminal intent. Maybe you could add some kind of disclaimer to the episode to point people to one of the many great parkour websites (IE. www.UrbanFreeFlow.com) or maybe saying something stressing that you do not want nor mean to shed a negative light on the sport. If you do the thousands of traceurs of the United States would greatly appreciate it and will thank you.
sincerely,
Alex Scott, concerned traceur
 
As an active member of the parkour community, one of my primary goals in the discpline is spreading the word about parkour and getting people interested. Although I am ecstatic about the concept of parkour being featured on national television, I feel that depicting it as something that can be used to aid criminal activity will contradict the efforts of myself and countless other traceurs to promote a positive image of parkour. In my eight months as a traceur, I have never heard so much as a rumor about someone using parkour to commit a criminal act - our art and the people who practice it are simply better than that. Given the massive amount of time and training we dedicate to bettering ourselves in parkour, we as a community feel that such a negative representation of our art would be contradictory to our interests and could potentially turn people off to parkour who may have otherwise taken an interest in it.
 
It is possible that the person suspected of using parkour to commit a crime is innocent. The CSI shows often present a red herring early in the episode to lead them down one avenue before they find the real culprit.

Hopefully this will end up being positive exposure for Parkour. I admit, I'd never heard of it until reading this article.
 
Umm this is a response to all the posts saying they've never heard of using the sport as a crime...I don't think NY is portraying it negatively. CBS wanted to use an interesting storyline, so they went with that. Like Top41 said, the person might be innocent. I don't see how one ep of a show can make everyone think bad of a sport...
 
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