Prank Leads to Shooting We All Need to Learn From

Back in my day, people played “ding-dong ditch” all the time. No one recorded it for social media because there was no social media, and video cameras were massive. Plus, we were smart enough not to record our shenanigans.

And the cameras were too massive for us to be stupid.

But the problem today is that people get social media clout for doing stupid things. It feeds into the human need for validation and attention. As pranks go, though, ding-dong ditch is an annoyance, but it’s not the end of the world. It’s still stupid and people need to seriously rethink what they’re doing, though.

Especially when you have this as a potential outcome.

A 42-year-old man has been charged with murder for allegedly shooting an 11-year-old boy who rang his doorbell and ran away.

Julian Guzman was playing the “ding dong ditch” prank game of ringing doorbells just before 23:00 local time (05:00 BST) on Saturday night in Houston, Texas, when he was shot, police said.

The man, identified as Gonzalo Leon Jr, was taken into custody on Tuesday and has been booked into Harris County Jail.

“Officers were told that Guzman was ringing doorbells of homes in the area and running away,” the Houston Police Department said in a statement. “A witness stated Guzman was running from a house, after ringing the doorbell, just prior to suffering a gunshot wound.”

Police said Guzman was wounded when they arrived at the scene and was taken to a nearby hospital. He later died on Sunday.

One person was detained on the scene for questioning and later released, they added.

OK, first, what the hell is an 11-year-old doing running around town at 11 at night? Yeah, it’s a Saturday, but still.

Still, let’s look at what happened for a moment. 

Look, playing a stupid game like this isn’t wise, but what Leon is accused of doing is so much worse.

From what we currently know, which may well change in the near future, is that Leon allegedly came out of his house and shot a child who was running away from his home, all because the child rang the doorbell late at night.

There doesn’t seem to be any mention of a weapon on the child. There’s no indication of a threatening action by the child. There’s nothing other than the kid doing something annoying.

Y’all, if we killed kids for being annoying, the human race would have ceased to exist eons ago.

Lethal force has its place, but it’s in response to threats to human life. Nothing about this appears to be a threat to anything other than a good night’s sleep.

On the flip side, let’s also recognize that parents need to have some degree of control over their children. Again, what the hell was an 11-year-old doing out playing pranks close to midnight for? Why wasn’t his happy butt in bed?

I’m not putting the blame on the parents, mind you. Part of that is that I don’t know that they didn’t have ever reason to believe the boy was at home. They might not have cared all that much, but I don’t know that.

Still, parents, make sure your kids are where they’re supposed to be as much as you can.

Armed citizens: Someone ringing your doorbell late at night and running away isn’t grounds to open fire. 

All that said, I’m fully prepared to learn there’s something else to this story that we haven’t been told. That happens an awful lot, so I can’t rule out it happening again. If it does, I’ll gladly acknowledge it.

If not, then this is an example of what not to do.

Editor’s note: While bad things happen far too often, most gun owners are responsible, law-abiding folks, despite how anti-gunners try to paint them.

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