Sudetenland Tales by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview

Sudetenland Tales

Page 350

Law enforcement agencies across the country are warning of both trends, the former of which challenges social media users to explore abandoned buildings and the latter of which challenges them to kick in strangers' doors.

While the door kicking challenge has existed for years, multiple agencies have issued recent warnings, indicating a possible uptick in the trend this summer. An Ohio police department recently warned about the challenge, saying it is investigating four incidents that occurred in Byesville.

Social media challenges prompt users to create more "content that elicits a reaction," Bark Technologies CMO Titania Jordan said. "Reports of doors being kicked in on homes began to come in during the middle of the night. Officers have collected evidence from neighborhoods indicating that a social media trend called the ‘Door Kicking Challenge’ is behind these acts," the Byesville Police Department said in a Facebook post. "The suspects are not entering the homes; instead, they are merely kicking the front doors and then fleeing the scene."

Byesville police added that authorities are collecting physical evidence from the scenes of these crimes, including video footage.