Indiana teen, Mason Bogard passes away after being critically injured playing choking game he saw on social media with fatal consequences.
An Indiana teen on Monday afternoon officially died after being gravely injured replicating a ‘choking game’ that he saw on social media.
Mason Bogard’s mother of Evansville, said something went ‘horribly wrong’ when her son tried to temporarily asphyxiate himself late Wednesday after seeing the practice of self-strangulation or assisted strangulation online.
‘The challenge is based on the idea that you choke yourself to the point of almost passing out and then stop,’ Joan Jackson Bogard wrote in a Facebook post Sunday. ‘It’s supposed to create a type of high. Unfortunately, it has taken the lives of many young people too early and it will take our precious Mason.’
The incident led to her son being rushed to hospital, with doctors over the weekend saying it was highly unlikely the boy would survive given the severe brain damage he’d suffered.
By late Monday, Vanderburgh County Coroner Steve Lockyear confirmed Bogard’s death. The coroner says he has not performed the autopsy yet, so the exact cause of his death has not been determined.
Bogard’s mother in her Facebook post thanked doctors at Deaconess Hospital for doing everything they could to in attempting to save her son. The family is now preparing to donate the teen’s organs.
‘While we are devastated that we will never experience so many things with Mason again, we are able to find some comfort in the fact that Mason will save the lives of others,’ Bogard’s post continued. ‘He would have wanted it this way. He was an extremely generous young man.’
Noted Bogard’s mother in a late Monday afternoon post, ‘Our brave hero will be donating his organs today at 4:30 PM. He will be giving life to 6 people’.
Bogard also warned other parents to monitor what their children view on social media, despite concerns that they may be a bit overprotective.
‘Unfortunately, we will not have the opportunity to experience so many things with our child because of a stupid challenge on social media,’ Bogard wrote.
In a subsequent post late Sunday, Bogard said Mason still had fluid in his lungs.
‘Please pray that he continues to improve his lung function to give his recipient the best lungs possible,’ the post read. ‘He has already surpassed expectations and is almost there. He is still showing us how strong he is!’
Mason Bogard Choking game challenge victim just another casualty:
‘The ‘choking game’ is defined as self-strangulation or strangulation by another person with the hands or a noose to achieve a brief euphoric state caused by cerebral hypoxia,’ according to the CDC. ‘Serious neurologic injury or death can result if strangulation is prolonged.’
The choking challenge has gone by many names over the years, including ‘Flatliner,’ ‘Pass-Out Challenge’ and ‘Space Monkey,’ according to TIME.
Of note, eighty-two children between ages 6 and 19 died after playing the so-called choking game between 1995 and 2007, according to the Evansville Courier & Press, citing a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report with the agency’s most recent statistics.
Seventy-one of the victims were male and the average age was just over 13, according to the 2008 report, which noted that serious neurological injury or death can result if strangulation is prolonged.
The earliest known death due to the stunt took place in 1995, with three or fewer deaths following in each year between 1995 and 2004. A total of 22 deaths were recorded in 2005, followed by 35 fatalities in 2006, according to the CDC report.
And among the 42 deaths in which sufficient details were reported, 92 percent of the victim’s parents said they didn’t know about the choking game until their child died, the report found.
‘Hug your children, tell them you love them,’ Bogard’s initial post concluded. ‘Enjoy every moment and let the little issues go.’
