On Sunday, in a horrifying incident at the famed Tate Modern Art Gallery in London, a six-year-old boy was allegedly pushed by a 17-year-old boy from a tenth-floor balcony and is fighting for his life in a hospital.
According to The Mirror, Met Police stated:
A child fell from height and is being taken to hospital by London’s Air Ambulance. A teenager has been arrested in connection with the incident … The six year-old victim was found on a fifth floor roof. He was treated at the scene and taken to hospital by London’s Air Ambulance. A 17-year-old male had remained with members of the public on the tenth floor viewing platform. There is nothing to suggest that he is known to the victim. The teenager was arrested by police officers on suspicion of attempted murder and taken into police custody.
The Mirror quoted an eyewitness to the incident saying, “I heard the impact and then screaming from above as a woman screamed ‘He’s my son! He’s my son!’ I went inside because the screaming was horrific; the boy didn’t make any noise but the people from the viewing platform were screaming.”
The Daily Mail added, “The art gallery was put into lockdown, with no one allowed in or out, after the boy fell from the exterior viewing platform on the tenth floor of the Blavatnik Building and was found on a fifth floor roof.” The Daily Mail noted that the top floor of the Blavatnik Building has an open viewing terrace.
A London Ambulance spokesperson stated, “We were called at 2.40pm today (4 August) to reports of an incident at the Tate Modern. We sent two ambulance crews, an incident response officer, a medic in a response car and an advanced paramedic to the scene. We also dispatched London’s Air Ambulance and our Hazardous Area Response Team (HART). We treated a person at the scene and took them to hospital as a priority.”
A Metropolitan Police spokesman reported that the boy is in critical but stable condition.
The London incident was eerily similar to an April 2019 incident at the Mall of America in Minnesota where a five-year-old boy was seized from his mother and thrown from a third-floor balcony, suffering head trauma, multiple broken bones, and his spleen removed. In that incident, Emmanuel Aranda, 24, was arrested and charged with attempted premeditated first-degree murder after approaching Landen Hoffmann, 5, and his mother, who were standing outside the Rainforest Cafe on the third floor, when Aranda allegedly asked if he was in their way. When Landen’s mother said no, Aranda allegedly grabbed the little boy and threw him over the balcony, according to witnesses.
According to The Daily Mail, “Aranda allegedly told police that he went to the mall looking for someone to kill as revenge for being rejected by women there for several years.”
In mid-May, Aranda made a plea deal with the court and was sentenced to 19 years in prison after pleading guilty to attempted premeditated first-degree murder while prosecutors eschewed adding an aggravated circumstances aspect to the charges that would have added one more year to the sentence.