Karl Jackson, The Man Who Confronted Teens That Were Throwing Eggs
TwitterKarl Jackson was murdered on Halloween following a confrontation with teenagers throwing eggs.
On Oct. 31, 1998, 21-year-old Karl Jackson got out of his car in the Bronx, New York, to confront a group of teenagers throwing eggs. But shortly after Jackson reentered his vehicle, one of the teens pulled a gun — and shot Jackson in the head.
“A young life was snuffed out over nothing,” Jackson’s father, Karl Jackson Sr., told The New York Times. “But that’s what Halloween has gotten into. He never used to go out on Halloween. He always said it was too dangerous, even as a teenager. But this year he wanted to take the child out.”
According to Jackson’s father, Jackson had made an exception in 1998 to take his girlfriend Darlene and her nine-year-old son Clyde to a Halloween party. Once the party ended, Jackson planned to drop Clyde off at home with a babysitter so that he and Darlene could go to another party.
Susan L. Angstadt/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty ImagesEgging on Halloween is such a problem in some places, like New York City, that stores often refuse to sell eggs to minors at the end of October.
On the way, however, their car got egged by a group of teenagers. Jackson briefly stepped out of the vehicle to confront the group before returning to the passenger seat. Then, one of the teens shot Jackson in the head.
“I think it took us two years to even talk about it,” Jackson’s mother, Gloria, told The New York Times in 2010. “We were just devastated. We never thought that anyone from our family would be murdered, especially on a holiday, for something stupid.”
Karl Jackson’s Halloween murder is far from the only incident of egging-related violence in New York, however. Between 1984 and 2010, The New York Times reports, 24 people in the city were killed or seriously injured in “egg-throwing confrontations.”
The 17-year-old boy who was prosecuted for killing Jackson, Curtis Sterling, was sentenced to 20 years in prison. According to The New York Times, Jackson’s mother sends him a Halloween card every year stating that she’s happy he’s still behind bars.
