Police are warning after a group of what appear to be teenagers began kicking down doors of homes in a Chicago suburb as part of a dangerous TikTok trend authorities say could become “tragic”– or result in felony charges.
It’s being called the “door kick challenge and cases have been reported across the U.S., though they have only recently been reported in the Chicago area, according to authorities.
In northwest suburban Sleepy Hollow, one woman said she was awakened in the middle of the night by what she thought was a large tree falling.
“It startled me awake. I went outside to see what it was and none of the large trees had fallen on my house so I figured it might have been a large branch,” said resident Anne Ybarra. “There was nothing I could do about it in the middle of the night. I woke up in the morning, instead I saw all the damage to my front door and in the entry way.”
The overnight scene at Ybarra’s house was all caught on security camera footage.
“You could see kids running up to the house, you hear the noise of them trying to break into my front door, you see security lights going on, you hear more kicking, then you hear kids running down the driveway and you can see two of them and two of them and then they’re laughing — ‘We gotta get out of here,'” Ybarra said.
Police said Ybarra’s house was one of two hit on July 23 within minutes of each other in the normally quiet Chicago suburb.
It’s a crime Chief Sam Parma said could be more dangerous than expected.
“They have no idea who’s on the other side of the door,” Parma told NBC Chicago. “They don’t know if it’s an elderly person who, because of this action, is going to cause them to go into a medical emergency. They don’t know if its going to be a veteran who has PTSD that’s going to react in a certain way. They don’t know if it’s going to be an armed homeowner who may react a certain way and if that ends up being tragic outcome where you get a kid getting shot where they’re doing something stupid… there’s absolutely no good outcome that could come from something like this.”
Ybarra said her door cost a couple thousand to repair the damage.
“This isn’t anything funny. It’s expensive. It’s alarming. It does damage to people’s homes, their sense of security in the community… it’s going to lead to actions taken against these kids, which is not great. I’m sure they didn’t think that far,” she said.
Parma said similar cases have been reported in other Chicago suburbs in a trend he said was “inevitable” and would “get to everybody.”
Similar cases have been reported in Florida, Minnesota, California and more.
Parma warned, however, that the consequences could be heightened depending on what happens next.
“If we catch them through our own investigation and they don’t come forward on their own, my goal is to charge them with a felony criminal damage to property, mob action … depends on what’s appropriate, but I’m going to charge them with a felony because I want them to understand,” he said. “I want everybody to understand that those types of activities in Sleepy Hollow or any town should not be accepted and it won’t be accepted. If they come forward on their own, could do restorative action and justice.”
The Sleepy Hollow Police Department said they have video evidence, forensic evidence and witness testimony in the case so far.
“Once we identify the suspects through investigation, all offers, consideration and opportunity to utilize local adjudication will be off the table,” the department wrote in an alert on Facebook.