An American man who was filmed performing the Heimlich maneuver on his adopted son was mistaken for abusing the child by an angry mob in Bogota, Colombia.
A video taken by a woman in northern Bogota on Saturday appeared to show the Texan holding a child on his balcony. In the viral clip, the woman screams, 'He's abusing the child, let him go!' as others yell for the police. The man looks out at the shouting people and then ushers the child inside.
He was quickly surrounded by an angry mob trying to break into the apartment complex. Protests formed outside the tower's lobby, preventing him from fleeing. Police were called and arrested him on suspicion of child abuse, escorting him through the baying crowds whipped up by concerns over child sex tourism in the country.
Details of the Incident
The man, a 36-year-old Texan, was initially accused of abusing a 7-year-old boy. However, it was later revealed that he had been trying to stop his adopted son from choking to death on food.
President Gustavo Petro said: 'I must notify Colombian society because my commitment is to the truth, that the American citizen of Texan origin, captured in an apartment in northern Bogotá, apparently did not violate any of his adopted children in Colombia. He took him out to the balcony due to a clog from eating the food poorly. The images deceived the Colombians who went en masse to defend the child. Now we have indeed made victims of boys and girls. If these indications of the facts are confirmed, justice must grant him all his rights as a human being.'
Children Taken into Care
Three children were found by authorities when they entered the suspect's apartment and were taken to a medical center to be evaluated, Mayor Carlos Galan said in a post on X. Colombia's state agency for child protection confirmed that the three children are now in its care.
The President said the children had now been made victims following the actions of the crowd. He also warned that AI had riled up crowds and that Colombia would be vulnerable to manipulation from foreign powers, especially during elections. Invoking Simon Bolivar, he added: 'A good lesson in reality for those of us who can easily be collectively deceived by images that do not match reality, and that is precisely what the entire Colombian society lives through, bombarded by companies with artificial intelligence. Here they transformed, as it seems to be the same case of the supposedly paedophile American, reality into virtuality.'
'Massive, collective deception through manipulation of consciousness. Colombians are exposed, like the whole world, to computer manipulation, and it is being fully used in these elections in Colombia. They want to dumb us down through artificial intelligence on information channels. I believe we have transformed into a paedophile, someone who is not.'
An official report from the prosecutor's office determined 'there had been no sexual abuse and no physical violence,' and 'no evidence indicating criminal conduct,' according to the Colombian news outlet Noticias Caracol.
