Former pro surfer known for riding huge Pipeline waves dies in shark attack while surfing off Oahu

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Former pro surfer known for riding huge Pipeline waves dies in shark attack while surfing off Oahu

2024-06-25 12:50 Last Updated At：19:20

A well-known Hawaii lifeguard who was killed in a shark attack while surfing off Oahu’s North Shore was a former professional surfer with acting credits to his name, including a role in one of the “Pirates of the Caribbean" movies.

Tamayo Perry, 49, was killed Sunday near Goat Island, Shayne Enright of the Honolulu Emergency Services Department said in a statement.

It's not known if Perry was the first professional surfer to be killed in a shark attack, since the definition of a professional in the sport can be blurry, said Brendan Buckley, the editor of Stab Magazine, a website devoted to surfing.

“But in terms of a high-level surfer that people around the world know and respected, he's the first that I'm aware of,” Buckley told The Associated Press Monday from his office in Portugal.

Perry and his wife, Emilia Perry, operated the Oahu Surfing Experience, offering surfing lessons. According to his biography on the business' website, he surfed professionally for over 15 years, highlighted by winning the Pipeline Master trials in 1999.

The Pipeline off Oahu's North Shore is famous for creating a tube that surfers ride for as long as they can. But it's also the most deadly wave in the world, killing some of the world's best surfers, Buckley said. Surfing it became Perry’s specialty, he said.

Surfers either focus on competitions or what they can do outside of those meets.

Perry “was never like somebody that was going to contend for a world title,” Buckley said. "He was more of the type to just kind of hunt down big, crazy waves and have that documented.”

“For a while, he was one of the top, top, top people out there," Buckley added. ”He got some of the craziest waves of his era. He was insanely respected by obviously everybody there and everybody around the world for what he did.”

Perry said on his website that he took to heart lessons learned from a near-fatal accident while surfing the Pipeline years ago.

“The lessons I’ve taken from that event have inspired me to my goal of instilling proper surf etiquette and safety into those whom I teach,” he wrote.

Emilia competed as a professional bodyboarder in western Australia before moving to Hawaii when she was 18. She and Tamayo met when she was bodyboarding out to a Pipeline wave.

“A few years later, I picked up a surfboard, we got married and there was no turning back,” she wrote. “The vast amounts of ocean knowledge that Tamayo has ingrained in me over the years is priceless.”

Tamayo Perry began his career as a lifeguard on the North Shore for the City and County of Honolulu Ocean Safety in July 2016, Enright said.

Perry's other passion was acting. He had several small roles credited to him on the film website www.imdb.com, including playing a buccaneer in “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” in 2011. That same year, he appeared in an episode of the television series “Hawaii Five-0.” He was also in a couple of national commercials.

"When I’m not acting, I’m still quite a character, so there’s always a ton of fun to be had," he said.

Photographer Brian Bielmann had known and worked with Perry for 25 years, shooting the surfer in both Hawaii and Tahiti. Perry and several friends wound up at a party about five months ago, when Bielmann said they had an incredible bonding experience.

“There’s about five of us there, and we’ve all called each other and just said, ‘We just are so thankful that we had that night with him,’” he said. “Everybody is just shaken to the core. I mean, it’s a gnarly thing to have happen no matter who it is, but to find out it was Tamayo, it’s crazy, man.”

Honolulu Ocean Safety and the city's fire, police and emergency medical services departments responded to Malaekahana Beach on Oahu's North Shore just before 1 p.m. Sunday after a caller reported seeing a man who appeared to have suffered shark bites, Enright said.

Lifeguards brought Perry to shore, where he was pronounced dead, Enright said.

Ocean Safety personnel posted shark warnings in the area following the attack, Enright said.

Honolulu Ocean Safety Acting Chief Kurt Lager said Perry was “a lifeguard loved by all.”

“Tamayo's personality was infectious and as much as people loved him, he loved everyone else more," Lager said at a news conference.

“Tamayo was a legendary waterman and highly respected,” Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi said, calling Perry’s death “a tragic loss.”

The last fatal shark incident in Hawaii was Dec. 30 when a man surfing off Maui was attacked about 150 yards (137 meters) from shore.

Thiessen reported from Anchorage, Alaska.

The Latest: Retrial of Karen Read begins in the death of her Boston police officer boyfriend

2025-04-22 23:45 Last Updated At：23:51

DEDHAM, Mass. (AP) — The second murder trial of Karen Read, whose case has sparked a national debate on police accountability and won her legions of devoted fans, began Tuesday with opening statements addressing theories about how her Boston police officer boyfriend ended up dead.

Read is accused of striking John O’Keefe with her SUV in 2022 and leaving him to die alone in the snow outside of a house party in the town of Canton, a suburb about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Boston. She has been charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating a vehicle under the influence and leaving the scene.

During the first trial last year, prosecutors said Read intentionally backed into O’Keefe after she dropped him off at a house party and returned hours later to find him dead. The defense said she was a victim of a vast police conspiracy and that O’Keefe was fatally beaten by another law enforcement officer at the party.

A mistrial was declared last year after jurors said they were at an impasse and deliberating further would be futile. A new prosecutor, Hank Brennan, is heading the state's case for the retrial. Attorney Alan Jackson presented the defense's opening statement.

Here’s the Latest:

As he did during the first trial, Jackson said Read’s taillight was damaged that morning as she clipped another vehicle at O’Keefe’s house, where she was staying, not from hitting O’Keefe after she dropped him off at the party.

He said the defense will introduce a video to show how the taillight was damaged.

“During the course of this trial, the commonwealth is going to desperately claim that Karen Read taillight was actually damaged by hitting John O’Keefe,” he told jurors. “They’ll have no evidence of it mind you. None. But they’ll make the claim.”

Jackson called the case “the very definition of reasonable doubt” and said prosecutors can not meet their burden of proof “when every piece of this case was handled by a disgraced investigator with a motive to protect his friends”

“By the end of this trial, you’ll conclude that Karen Read is not guilty of hitting John O’Keefe with her SUV. There was no collision,” he said. “She’s the victim of a botched and biased and corrupted investigation that was never about the truth, folks. It was about preserving loyalty.”

Jackson said O’Keefe’s injuries do not suggest he was hit by a car at all.

“Not a bruise,” the defense lawyer said.

Jackson told the jury that they will learn O’Keefe had abrasions consistent with being bitten by a dog. He said the injury to O’Keefe’s head was also not consistent with falling backwards onto the ground, as prosecutors alleged.

Jackson said medical evidence will also establish that hypothermia was not a factor, as prosecutors alleged. He said O’Keefe was injured somewhere warm and then moved, and that establishes reasonable doubt.

Jackson described the state’s case as hinging on fired state trooper Michael Proctor, whom he described as a “cancer.”

Proctor was the lead investigator in the Read case. Jackson said Proctor is the key to the state’s case and is also its “Achilles heel.”

Jackson listed a litany of failures in the investigation, including that investigators didn’t search the house, secure the crime scene or properly collect evidence. He then touched on sexist and crude texts about Read’s family and colleagues that surfaced during the first trial and eventually led to Proctor’s firing.

Jackson characterized Read as victimized by a police culture that sought go protect fellow cops.

Read’s defense team used its opening statement to describe her as a victim of a cover-up and to stress that she didn’t kill O’Keefe.

“At the end of the day folks, there was no collision with John O’Keefe,” Jackson said.

The defense attorney said the case will show that O’Keefe wasn’t hit by Read’s car. He acknowledged that O’Keefe’s death was a “tragic loss,” but said the investigation was corrupted by bias and deceit.

“The evidence in this case will establish ... above everything else three points — there was no collision with Jon O’Keefe. There was no collision. There was no collision,” Jackson said. “John O’Keefe did not die from being hit by a vehicle. The facts will show that. The evidence will show that. The data will show that. The science will show that and the experts will tell you that.”

Read and O’Keefe were headed to the end of their relationship before O’Keefe died, Brennan said.

He described how the couple’s relationship was faltering before O’Keefe died. They were arguments a few days before O’Keefe was killed and that O’Keefe had asked Read to leave, he said.

Brennan said text messages will be presented showing the tension between the couple and how Read would become irate when her calls weren’t returned.

“You will read those text messages and you will realize this was the beginning of the end of this relationship,” he told the jurors.

Brennan told the jury that O’Keefe was a “family man” who was a pillar of his community and was much more than just a police officer.

O’Keefe was a single parent of two children whom he adopted when his sister and her husband died within months of each other, Brennan said. Brennan said he cared for the children as if they were his own and provided them stability and love.

O’Keefe’s tumultuous relationship with Read changed all that, Brennan said.

“They led a good life,” Brennan said. “Enter Karen Read.”

Brennan began opening statements by describing the scene where O’Keefe was found dead.

He opened by describing how firefighters and paramedics got a call about a cardiac arrest. They jumped into the ambulance and headed out in near blizzard conditions. Their ambulance was sliding along the road and they couldn’t hear anything beyond the sound of the siren.

Arriving at 34 Fairview Road, they came upon a chaotic scene.

“He stepped out into bedlam,” Brennan said. “He heard a woman screaming.”

They came upon Karen Read, who he said told paramedics, “I hit him, I hit him.”

“It was at that time in the words of the defendant that she admitted what she had done that night, that she hit John O’Keefe,” Brennan said.

The judge addressed the heavy public interest in the trial before opening statements began.

Judge Beverly Cannone told the jury to ignore public comment about the trial while it is going on. She also told jurors it’s important not to conduct independent research or look at news coverage of the trial.

“You will decide what the facts are, where the evidence is contested, you will determine where the truth lies,” she said. “This trial will be decided by you, an independent jury.”

Cannone also told the jury not to use social media during the trial.

The jurors have entered the courtroom and received their instructions for the trial.

After giving them the instructions, the judge asked if they had refrained from discussing the case or doing any independent research about it.

The court also heard the charges against Read.

Judge Beverly Cannone said she received four motions over the weekend that need to be addressed.

She ruled that the defense can’t mention a consulting firm in their openings, which led the defense to request to be heard. They then entered into a sidebar with the defense arguing the firm should be mentioned.

The courtroom is packed, with little room for anyone other than essential court personnel and media.

The trial seats about 10 people on both sides. Read’s family is on one side and the O’Keefe’s are on the other – about 10 on each side.

Read could be seen chatting and smiling with her attorneys Alan Jackson and David Yannetti. Reporters are behind them, sitting on stools.

Barriers are set up on both sides of the street in front of the building. Several state troopers and police officers are also positioned around the courthouse.

Police ordered a truck driver who slowed down to yell “Free Karen Read” to move along, and also chased off someone who was shooting video with their phone.

Read arrived at court just before 8:50 a.m. to some cheers from assembled supporters.

Family members from both sides also arrived just before 9 a.m.

Read smiled briefly as she entered the court. She did not answer a question about whether she was ready for her second trial.

The court had a police presence to try to maintain order as supporters gathered outside.

Supporters of Karen Read have assembled outside court in advance of her new trial.

The scene among supporters is similar to a reunion, with people hugging one another and calling out their names.

Ashlyn Wade, a Read supporter from Canton, where John O’Keefe was killed, said she was there to hopefully see Read cleared of charges.

“I’m here for justice,” she said. “The murderer going to jail and Karen being Exonerated — that would be justice.”

Dennis Sweeney, dressed as the judge in the case and wearing a pink T-shirt emblazoned with the word “assassin.” which was inspired by Read’s defense team, said he returned for the second trial because: “Karen Read is factually innocent and we want her freed.”