LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Police Department announced the execution of a successful raid, which revealed a stash of several unregistered paint rollers, paintbrushes, buckets and umbrellas belonging to a suspect under the alias of ‘Tim’. Tim, known online for his notoriety within the Splatoon community, had long been a person of interest for the department, police say.
“Many of his social media posts indicated intent to commit armed assault with weapons banned in the state,” says Officer Chloe Ducy. “For example, a post just last week expressed joy at hitting ‘several targets’ with his Splat Roller. We set up a stakeout and witnessed unusual behavior, including multiple visits to Home Depot in a single day. We obtained a warrant and were able to raid his home. Our officers discovered that Tim kept a collection of unregistered weapons including Five Rollers, Three Brushes, a long-tubed hose, a Squirt Gun, three Water Guns, three Buckets, a Washing Machine, a Bathroom Sink, four Umbrellas, a fuel pump nozzle, a windshield wiper, an AR-15, several hose spray nozzles, a pencil, a ballpoint pen, several water balloons and sprinklers, and a single bottle of wine. Everything except the AR-15 had been illegally obtained. We seized it all as evidence.”
While Tim was unavailable for comment, his lawyer released a statement on his behalf.
“Splat Tim owned the utensils purely for decoration and home use,” read the statement, which was posted as a hand-written image in Splatoon’s in-game social media platform. “All references to violence committed with these tools was merely referring to the popular video game ‘Minecraft’ where buckets and assorted tools are also featured.”
The raid occurred after a concerning increase of mass inkings in the state, with some calling for bans on the sale of rollers and brushes. Many citizens have criticized the National Paint Association for their heavy lobbying in favor of the industry, though the organization denies any correlation between their political activities and real-world violence.
“It is the mission statement of the NPA that all citizens be allowed the right to bare paint, as our founding fathers intended,” says Sheldon, spokesperson for the NPA. “We believe that rollers don’t splat people, people splat people, and that the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a bucket is a good guy with dualies.”
Splat Tim is currently in jail awaiting trial, where he may be facing up to 10 minutes of downtime and 500 rank points.
