A 17-year-old Texas high school senior is hospitalized with critical injuries after he fell from the back of a Jeep while he was playing the game “Senior Assassin,” his mother said.
Raquel Vazquez told NBC Dallas-Fort Worth that her son, Isaac Leal, fell from the vehicle after, she believes, it hit a bump in the road.
“They were playing ‘Senior Assassin.’ He jumped on a young girl’s Jeep as it was parked,” she said.
Vazquez claimed the girl reversed and then “drove for five minutes at a high speed to where he could not jump off.” The vehicle hit a dip, causing Leal to fall and hit his head, his mother told the station.
The incident, which happened April 20 in Arlington, was partly caught on cellphone and security video, NBC Dallas-Fort Worth reported.
Police across the country have warned about the dangers of the game, in which players try to “assassinate” their targets, other students, by squirting them with water guns.
Last month, police in Claremore, Oklahoma, warned that water guns can be mistaken for real weapons and that hiding from your “assassin” could “lead to dangerous misunderstandings” with police and residents. The police department also said “trespassing and unsafe driving” have been reported as part of the game.
“While it may appear harmless on the surface, this game poses very real dangers to both students and the public,” the department said on Facebook.
Police in Sylvania, Ohio, said April 18 on Facebook that they had received multiple calls from concerned people who mistook the game for a real threat. The police department said students who play the game have disguised the toy guys “to appear more realistic” and have taken them onto private property and public roadways.
“Officers are dispatched to these incidents as ‘weapons calls’ and respond accordingly,” the department said.
It called for an “immediate cessation of these games in public areas” and said officers had been instructed to criminally charge anyone who engages in dangerous behavior or whose actions prompt a law enforcement call.
Arlington police said they were made aware of Leal's accident over the weekend and are investigating “to determine whether a criminal offense occurred.”
“In reviewing calls for service from the date the incident occurred, April 20, we learned that EMS responded to the accident site for what was described as an unconscious person,” the police department said in a statement. “PD, however, was never dispatched, and we were not notified that Mr. Leal’s injuries stemmed from a traffic incident until we spoke with his family this past weekend. The APD Traffic Division is leading the investigation. Based on the evidence we have reviewed, it appears Mr. Leal was hanging out the back of the vehicle when the accident occurred.”
Leal, a baseball player at the high school, remains hospitalized.
“I have not been able to go home because I can’t imagine going home without him,” his mother said.
