Joyriders beware.
Police took advantage of yesterday’s warming temperatures to nab several illegal dirt bikes and all-terrain vehicles in upper Manhattan, arresting three men and seizing a total of eight vehicles, authorities said.
Officers were told to be on the lookout yesterday for the vehicles, which have been plaguing some neighborhoods in the northern part of the borough and are often driven in reckless packs, cops said.
The cops were also instructed not to engage in pursuits if any of the riders attempted to flee on the vehicles.
Cops on patrol in an unmarked car spotted Andy Hernandez, 21, cruising down Broadway on his unregistered dirt bike at around 5 p.m. when they attempted to stop him near 138th Street.
Hernandez ditched his 2008 KTM 125 cc dirt bike and made a run for it, before hopping a fence and climbing onto a fire escape of a building of 138th Street.
The biker desperately made his way up to the top of the building before running along the rooftops of several adjoining building.
He was eventually caught and charged with reckless endangerment, resisting arrest, and a number of other charges, cops said.
About 20 minutes later, officers on the east side of Harlem tried to stop Donovan Hibbert, 28, for driving erratically on Second Avenue near 115th Street, before he too abandoned his bike and fled.
The officers quickly caught up with him before a brief struggle ensued that injured the two cops.
Hibbert was charged with reckless endangerment, obstruction of governmental administration and resisting arrest.
Police also arrested city sanitation worker Samuel Lopez after they witnessed him weaving in and out of traffic on his camouflage ATV near Madison Avenue and 135th Street and driving on the sidewalk, cops said.
Lopez was arrested as he was refueling his ATV at a nearby gas station. Another rider at the gas station abandoned his vehicle and ran when the cops arrived. His vehicle was also seized.