In the wake of the horrifying death of a 12-year-old boy, who was killed while playing chicken on a rolldown gate, a lawyer for the boy's family says they will sue. Alberto Ebanks said the Brooklyn apartment complex's guards were "asleep at the switch," not paying attention to surveillance cameras that showed Yakim Daniels and other children playing on the gate. Ebanks said, "They have blood on their hands as far I’m concerned."
Yakim had been playing chicken on the gate with friends. The gate would rise and descend when cars would enter and leave the lot, via sensors. At one point, when the gate was going up, Yakim got caught. One witness said, "The little boy just was hanging down from the waist, up to the neck was wrapped up in that. And they had to try to cut the gate down to get him out." Community members and City Councilman Charles Barron have said that complaints about the gate and demands for more play space for the children were repeatedly made to the complex. Also, the parking lot for the Plaza Residences apparently replaced a basketball court.
According to the Post, there's surveillance video showing the accident. First, the boys are shown playing chicken around 4:22 p.m.:
The video shows an adult walking by and the boys sitting, feigning no interest in the gate. As soon as the man passes, one boy is seen doing a little dance as the gate lowers to the ground.
Then the gate rises — possibly triggered by one of the boys with a remote control — and Yakim grabs on, followed by his pals.
His friends jump off when it’s half rolled up.
But Yakim does not.
The car arrives but does not enter the lot.
But inexplicably, the gate moves higher.
Yakim kicks his legs wildly as he struggles to get free — but by 4:26, his body is motionless.
At 4:29, a neighbor arrives with a ladder, but it’s too short to enable him to reach Yakim.
A separate video shows a security guard watching 16 video feeds from 350 cameras from around the complex and looking at a laptop computer during the tragedy.
At 4:33 p.m., when the Fire Department arrives, a security guard gets up.
Ronn Torrossian, a spokesman for Omni New York, which owns the complex, spoke to the Post and said of the lawsuit threat, "It is very unfortunate that people are taking advantage of this tragic situation for self-serving reasons, but any allegations that we were at all responsible is absurd. It is very unfortunate that a dangerous game of chicken resulted in a tragic death."
