Teens Filmed Throwing Water at Homeless People for TikTok Views

A group of teenagers apparently wanted people watching what they were doing around Sacramento County. They got their wish.

Videos circulating online show teens targeting homeless people and others, including throwing water and water bottles at people while recording the encounters for social media. The clips eventually reached CBS Sacramento, which went looking for people who had encountered the group.

Reporter Steve Large found Chip Stockton outside an Arden-area Safeway. Stockton says his encounter was not limited to a cup of water or something thrown from a distance. He told CBS that a member of the group approached him and kicked him.

Stockton then recognized the person he says kicked him while watching one of the videos now circulating online. By the time CBS spoke with him, the clips had turned what might otherwise have remained a confrontation outside a grocery store into a much more public record of the group’s behavior.

Same Faces

“They physically assaulted me,” Stockton told CBS.

Stockton said he had put on his backpack and turned around when one member of the group came up and kicked him. While watching the circulating footage with CBS, he pointed out a teenager he said was the same person.

The videos themselves show homeless people among those being targeted. CBS described teens throwing water bottles at them while somebody recorded the encounters for posting online.

The footage also spread well beyond the accounts that originally posted it. TizzyEnt, a creator known for highlighting incidents submitted by viewers, brought additional attention to the Sacramento videos.

That attention produced plenty of anger, but it also raised a more practical question: had anyone reported what happened?

No Report Yet

@tizzyentSacramento CA, Who are they?♬ original sound – TizzyEnt

CBS reported that the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office was aware of the circulating videos. The department told the station that, as of its Sept. 8 report, it had not received a report from any victim connected to them.

That includes Stockton.

He told CBS he would probably file one if deputies approached him about the incident and asked him to do so.

The distinction leaves the videos in an unusual position. Thousands of people can watch conduct unfold online, but a viral clip does not itself mean a victim has walked into a sheriff’s station or completed a report.

The Sheriff’s Office maintains options for reporting crimes occurring in its jurisdiction, including an online reporting system for qualifying incidents.

Known Problem

Stockton was not the only person CBS found who recognized the group.

Angel Melendez works in the shopping center and described the teens as a recurring problem there. He told the station that they appeared to be posting the encounters because “they want clout.”

“They want to blow up,” Melendez said.

Instead, the videos have begun circulating through accounts condemning what they show, including the TizzyEnt post and a CBS television report.

For Stockton, the internet reaction came after a much more direct encounter.

He says he already knows what it feels like when one of the people in those videos is standing in front of him.