Shooting of Ralph Yarl

The shooting of Ralph Yarl occurred on April 13, 2023, in Kansas City, Missouri. The 16-year-old teenager was shot twice after ringing the doorbell at the wrong house. Yarl was trying to pick up his twin brothers and mistakenly ended up at the wrong address.

Andrew Daniel Lester, an 84-year-old white man, was charged on April 17, 2023, with armed criminal action and first-degree assault, the equivalent of attempted murder in Missouri. The Clay County district attorney stated that there was a "racial component" to the shooting. If convicted, Lester faced 10 years to life in prison.

National media attention rose toward this first of four unrelated shootings across the US that week, which were all characterized by young people receiving gunfire for making a harmless mistake. The other three were the murder of Kaylin Gillis in Hebron, New York, after she entered the wrong driveway, the shooting of two cheerleaders in Elgin, Texas, after they entered the wrong car, and the shooting of Kinsley White and her parents in Gastonia, North Carolina, after her basketball rolled into a neighbor's yard.

A trial was scheduled to begin on October 7, 2024, but in September a judge ordered a mental health evaluation for October 8. On February 14, 2025, Lester pleaded guilty to second-degree assault. Clay County prosecutors announced on February 19, 2025, that Lester had died from medical issues at the age of 86. Provided by Wikipedia