By Nils Kottmann
Leon Brown (14) was lying lifeless in his children’s room in Cumbernauld (Scotland) when his mother Lauryn (30) found him. The teenager had strangled himself – for a Tiktok challenge.
Leon just wanted to squeeze until he passed out and impress his friends. Instead, he died before her eyes. He suffered the same fate as Brit Archie Battersbee (†12) just a few weeks before him.
Archie choked so violently in April that doctors pronounced him brain dead. But because his heart was still beating, Archie’s parents fought for his life up to the European Court of Human Rights – and lost. Life support was withdrawn on August 6th.
The whole world took part in the fate of the 12-year-old from Southend (England). Apparently that wasn’t enough to keep Leon from the life-threatening Tiktok challenge. “I heard about this challenge because of what happened to Archie,” Leon’s mother, Lauryn Keating, told the Daily Record“. “You still don’t expect your own child to do that.”
But on August 25, Leon Brown called his friends on Facetime. Then he put his hands around his neck and squeezed hard. “He and his friends probably thought it was all very funny. But Leon didn’t regain consciousness. It all went horribly wrong,” said Lauryn Keating. There was nothing more she could do for her lifeless son.
Archie Battersbee was kept alive for around four months Photo: picture alliance/dpa/PA Media | hollie dance
A spokesman for Tiktok said of the choke challenge that claimed the lives of at least two children: “Content of this nature is prohibited and will be deleted if we find it.”
There are still dozens of videos on the Chinese platform in which children and young people choke themselves to the point of unconsciousness.