A Jackass Star Has Gone Missing
Here's hoping they're found soon.
This article is more than 2 years old
One of the members of the decades-old reality Jackass franchise — Bam Margera — has a long history of legal battles and substance abuse. Unfortunately, today there’s reason to believe that history is going to keep getting longer for a while. Police are now searching for Margera, who went missing from a rehab facility and was last seen this past Saturday.
TMZ reports Bam Margera left the rehab facility in Deerfield Park, Florida where he was receiving court-mandated treatment on Saturday. He was last seen after leaving the facility without permission wearing “a black shirt, black sweatpants and black sneakers.” Broward County Detectives are searching for him and are asking anyone who sees him to contact them.
This is the skateboarder’s second disappearance from Deerfield Park’s LifeSkills facility in less than a month. According to TMZ, Bam Margera was triggered after a break-up with his wife Nikki Boyd and walked out of the facility on June 13. In that instance, he was found a couple of days later and escorted back to rehab by the police and a crisis intervention team.
According to Movie Web, Margera’s court-mandated stay at LikeSkills began after an encounter with police last September. Law enforcement was called after reports that the Jackass star was allegedly “acting belligerently” in a hotel bar. Upon arrival, the police discovered there was an ex parte order on file for Bam Margera, meant to place the skateboarder in rehab.
Over a year ago, Bam Margera announced on social media that he had been given the boot from the reality franchise’s latest endeavor, this year’s Jackass Forever. Soon afterward, Margera filed a lawsuit in the hopes of stopping the film from getting released. The stunt performer claimed he was forced to sign a “Wellness Agreement” for the film without the benefit of a lawyer’s review, and that the contract included weekly drug and alcohol tests.
This past January, Johnny Knoxville opened up about the situation with Rolling Stone, calling it “heartbreaking.” Knoxville told the magazine, “I love Bam. We all love Bam. He’s our brother, you know? You just hope that he takes it upon himself to get the help that he needs, because we all care about him a lot.” A little less than a year after Margera’s firing, Jackass Forever enjoyed a successful theatrical release and pulled in a worldwide gross of $80 million.
Bam Margera was part of the early cast of MTV’s Jackass; getting recruited from his CKY video series of stunts. After the first series shuttered, Margera got his own MTV show, Viva La Bam, which ran for five seasons. He’s since gone in and out of other projects, including independent films and music.
Including appearing visibly intoxicated in his various TV projects like Jackass and Viva La Bam, Bam Margera’s public struggles with substance abuse and the law go back at least as far as 2009 — the year he first entered rehab. Along with a string of arrests, hospitalizations, and scandals, Bam Margera was removed from a commercial flight for being too inebriated to fly in 2019. Afterward the reality star made a public cry for help to Dr. Phil, leading to yet another stay at a treatment center.
