Man charged with ‘swatting’ after hoax call to US police and shooting of innocent citizen
WARNING: This story includes graphic images of injuries. Tyran Dobbs, the victim, was shot twice and suffered life-changing facial injuries, according to documents from Warwick Crown Court.
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A man has been charged with “swatting” after he placed a fake call to police in the US and led officers to shoot an innocent man in what they thought was a hostage situation, authorities said.
Robert Walker-McDaid, from Coventry, had called a terrorism hotline in Maryland in 2015, leading a SWAT team to go to the victim’s home and shoot him with plastic bullets.
Walker-McDaid posed as Tyran Dobbs and told police he had explosives and was holding hostages.
Dobbs, the victim, was shot twice and suffered life-changing facial injuries, according to documents from Warwick Crown Court.
Walker-McDaid, 28, has become the first defendant in the UK to be charged with “swatting,” a phenomenon where hoax calls in the US prompt SWAT police units to be called in, according to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).
READ MORE: Man shot dead by police ‘was victim of swatting hoax after gaming row'
Walker-McDaid was initially sentenced to 20 months’ imprisonment but the sentence was later suspended by a judge for 18 months.
Detectives said Walker-McDaid was asked to make the phone call by Zachary Lee, of Maryland, who he had met playing video games online.
On February 17, 2015, Lee messaged Walker-McDaid and said there was “someone I need swatted” and sent Dobbs’ address.
Walker-McDaid called Maryland’s terrorism hotline the next day and threatened executions unless he received $15,000, according to the CPS.
Subsequently, SWAT teams arrived at Dobbs’ home and shot him in the face and chest with plastic bullets, requiring him to undergo facial surgery, prosecutors said.
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The FBI and detectives in the US traced the initial phone call back to Walker-McDaid’s home address in Coventry.
He was prosecuted in the UK and did not face charges in US courts.
While Walker-McDaid told police he had been pressured into making the call, prosecutors were able to prove that he was a “willing and active participant” in the crime, the CPS said.
Lee was sentenced to two years in jail in 2018 for his role.
Hannah Sidaway, a specialist prosecutor for CPS West Midlands, said to BBC: “Walker-McDaid may not have intended to cause such serious harm, but by sowing panic and deceiving law enforcement into responding to a fictitious threat, he left an innocent man with life-changing injuries.”
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