Bored and mentally disturbed teenagers all across the country have found a new pastime in punching random people.
The game is called Knockout, and the idea is to approach an innocent bystander and deliver such a powerful blow that the individual is left unconscious.
The reported attacks have been increasingly violent and even, in some cases, fatal.
Why? Simply “for the fun of it,” said one teenage participant.
“They think it’s funny,” said another. “They just go, boom, when it’s the right time and the right place. It could be anybody, it could be a mother with her children. It’s a macho thing.”
The game first emerged in New York a few years ago and has resurfaced in the form of a number of recent attacks in New York, LA and London, among other major cities.
Three victims have been killed in the last two years.
Reported incidents include a Washington DC woman who was punched in the back of the head by a group of teens on bicycles who sped away laughing.
There was also a 15-year-old charged in Denver who hit a 50-year-old teacher so hard he fell face first onto a concrete curb.
“I was shocked at the whole narrative of it. There were six kids. There was me walking, just normally on my way, and boom came the punch and down I went, straight down with my face falling and hitting the cool concrete. I was shocked. I was speechless. I didn’t really know what to think,” James Addlespurger told WTAE-TV.
Footage from New Jersey shows a 46-year-old man being targeted by two teens, 13 and 14-years-old. The victim was later found dead with his head lodged between an iron fence. The two teens were charged with murder.
Other recent attacks have taken place in New Jersey and Missouri, two of which resulted in a pedestrian’s death.
“They just want to see if you’ve got enough strength to knock somebody out,” said one participant.
Both the New York Police Department and London Metropolitan believe the attacks are racist and confused teenagers’ attempts at hate crimes.
