Two teenage boys have been charged after they spent Friday night wearing tactical-style vests and masks and carrying what appeared to be rifles while knocking on doors in a New Castle County neighborhood, New Castle County police said.
The 16- and 17-year-old boys were identified Sunday after investigators received tips that helped them track down the pair following the incidents in the Mallard Pointe neighborhood of New Castle. New Castle County Police Department spokesperson Sgt. Andrea Botterbusch confirmed to Fox News Digital that officers arrested the juveniles Sunday evening.
Officers executed a search warrant at one of the teens’ homes as part of the investigation and recovered a gel bead gun, a tactical vest and a hockey-style mask.
Both juveniles were charged with two misdemeanor counts of harassment, one misdemeanor count of criminal mischief and two criminal trespassing violations. Arraignment information for both was still pending as of Monday.
Police said the investigation determined the teens had been knocking on residents’ doors late at night as part of a prank that rattled neighbors, but found no threats of violence had been made.
How the scare unfolded
Residents in Mallard Pointe reported seeing masked individuals approaching homes shortly before 11 p.m. Friday. Officers were dispatched to the 1200 block of Canvasback Drive around 10:50 p.m. after a report of a suspicious person.
Surveillance images released by police show one person wearing a black hockey-style mask and tactical-style vest holding what appears to be a rifle outside a home’s front door. A separate image shows another masked individual wearing a black vest approaching a residence.
Residents told investigators a masked person carrying what appeared to be a rifle had knocked on doors before running off. Police also reported seeing four individuals heading east on Mallard Road — two on bicycles and two on foot. Officers searched the neighborhood and nearby properties with a K-9 unit but could not locate anyone that night.
Investigators initially believed the apparent weapons might have been airsoft-style guns, though police have not confirmed whether the gel bead gun recovered from the search matches what was seen in the surveillance images.
The incident follows a separate case roughly 35 miles away in Philadelphia, where a man wearing a
