“How can you do this to my child and my family?” Laura Giacobbe said. After an investigation, police said there was no evidence that the 6-year-old boy was burned deliberately, as his family had initially claimed.
Recently, police in Bridgeport, Connecticut, announced that their investigation found no evidence 6-year-old Dominick Krankall was burned deliberately, which the boy’s family claimed was done by a neighborhood bully.
Now the mother of the boy who was called the bully is speaking out and sharing surveillance video of the alleged incident, which apparently shows a much different account than what was originally reported.
“I want the truth out that there was no bullying at all, whatsoever,” Laura Giacobbe told Inside Edition.
After the incident, Dominick was hospitalized on April 24 with severe burns on his face and body. His parents said that an 8-year-old neighbor had poured gasoline over a ball, lit it and threw it right at Dominick’s face.
Local police were so moved by Dominick's plight, and the fact that he wants to be a police officer, they organized a parade outside the hospital to cheer him up.
Giacobbe says that the day of the incident, she went out to run an errand and left two of her children in the care of Dominick's mom, Maria.
“She told me she had them, that they were safe, they were fine in the backyard,” Giacobbe said.
The video shows the children setting a soccer ball — not a tennis ball — on fire and kicking it. In the moments leading up to Dominick's injuries, Giacobbe's son grabs a container of gasoline, fills a cup, lights it on fire and leaves it on the ground.
Then, Dominick walks over to the cup and catches on fire. His pants may have been wet with gasoline.
It was reckless play, no doubt, but not the type of intentional attack that Dominick's family had claimed, according to police.
“They weren't playing with gasoline until I had left, so that’s when she had stated in the window to put it away. She should have come down there and should have removed it from them, and she neglected it. She neglected as a mother to do that,” Giacobbe said.
Police say after investigating, they found nothing on the video showing any bullying. It was vindication for Giacobbe, who says she and her son have been unfairly maligned.
“How can you do this to my child and my family?” she said.
No charges were filed. A neighbor of the families’ is quoted as saying the kids were trying to imitate a TikTok video.
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