‘I feel like someone encouraged her’: The 12-year-old girl was found dead at her home in Argentina after practicing the viral TikTok ‘blackout’ challenge – aunt says she became hanging from a rope found and friends watched as she killed herself on the live stream
- Milagros Soto died at home in Santa Fe, Argentina, on Friday after completing the viral TikTok “blackout” challenge.
- The 12-year-old is said to have received a link from a classmate prior to his participation in Dare
- The death was caused by “mechanical asphyxiation by hanging” and “there is no evidence of abuse or interference by a third party.”
A 12-year-old girl was found dead at her home in Argentina after practicing the viral TikTok “blackout challenge,” which was live-streamed to her school friends.
Milagros Soto was found dead in her bedroom by her father after he got home from work on Friday, her aunt Laura Luque told TV channel TeleNueve.
Luque said her niece received a link to the TikTok task, also known as the “choking challenge” or “fainting challenge,” via a WhatsApp message from one of her classmates at School #223, Lt. Gen. Pablo Riccieri in Capitán Bermudez, santa fe
Soto had tried twice to remove a rope from her neck, failed on the third attempt, and later tragically died while her friends watched.
The distraught aunt believes “someone” encouraged Soto to take up the sickening challenge and reveals her niece was mocked by classmates at her school.
Milagros Soto was found dead at her home in Santa Fe, Argentina, on Friday after taking part in the viral TikTok “blackout challenge.” The 12-year-old had a rope around her neck and was holding her breath and failed to remove it on two attempts as the challenge was livestreamed to her school friends. They attempted a third time to remove the rope and failed before dying
An autopsy found that Milagros Soto’s death was caused by “mechanical asphyxiation by hanging” and that “there is no evidence of abuse or interference by a third party.”
“We have a lot of doubts about everything that happened. She was a very smart girl. She was bullied a lot,” Luque told TV station El Trece. “She told us that nobody at school liked her because they said she looked pretty because she was blonde and had light blue eyes.”
“She was a happy person. unbelievable. An excellent niece, granddaughter, daughter,” said Luque. “A very hardworking girl because we have nothing else to say because everyone here knew her as the girl who smiled with those big eyes.”
A copy of the autopsy obtained by the Clarín newspaper showed that Soto’s death was caused by “mechanical asphyxiation by hanging” and that “there is no evidence of abuse or third-party interference.”
In a statement, officials from School No. 223 Lt. Gen. Pablo Riccieri remembered Soto as “a great student, classmate, sweet, good and kind.”
Laura Luque (pictured) said her brother-in-law found his 12-year-old daughter Milagros Soto dead in her bedroom on Friday after the murder
Milagros Soto (pictured) was reportedly bullied by her classmates because of her blonde hair and light blue eyes, according to her aunt
Milagros Soto, 12, died at her home in northeastern Argentina on Friday after taking part in the viral TikTok “blackout challenge,” which requires a person to hold their breath until they pass out and then share the show must she felt when she was conscious
Authorities seized Soto’s cell phone and are investigating whether any of the school’s students were involved in the deadly challenge.
“We are in a society where if you don’t you are not part of the group. If you don’t do what we tell you, you are (worthless),” Luque said, as quoted by Clarín. “This is ongoing, it’s being investigated, and I’m not going to stop until I know what happened to Milli. All I know is that she could not have taken her own life.”
The viral “blackout challenge” involves a person recording themselves holding their breath for as long as possible before passing out, and then explaining what they felt in a separate video.
According to People, the challenge dates back to 2008 and resurfaced on TikTok in 2021.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has attributed at least 80 deaths to social media users accepting the challenge.
Bloomberg Businessweek in November 2020 found that at least 15 children under the age of 12 had died from the challenge in the past 18 months. Another five deaths in children aged 13 to 14 were reported during the same period.