{"id":242609,"date":"2026-05-24T21:51:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:51:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/242609\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T21:51:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:51:08","slug":"devastated-family-of-brooklyn-boy-14-who-died-subway-surfing-begs-other-teens-to-stop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/242609\/","title":{"rendered":"Devastated family of Brooklyn boy, 14, who died subway surfing begs other teens to stop"},"content":{"rendered":"

The heartbroken family of a 14-year-old Brooklyn boy who died falling off the train while subway surfing over the Williamsburg Bridge<\/a> has a message for anyone considering the stunt:<\/p>\n

\u201cJust stop! Stop!\u201d Sharean Butler begged on Sunday. Butler helped raise the victim, Akhi Butler, who is her cousin\u2019s son.<\/p>\n

Social media clout isn\u2019t worth your life, Butler said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can get that somehow, someway, another way that\u2019s more safer,\u201d she said. \u201cThat is not it at all. And most of the times it ends up tragically.\u201d<\/p>\n

Akhi and an 18-year-old boy were found unconscious on the roadbed of the J and M lines on the Williamsburg Bridge around 6:50 p.m. Friday, according to police. Akhi died at the scene while the survivor is in currently in critical condition at Bellevue Hospital.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very hard,\u201d said Butler. \u201cWe\u2019ve all got heavy hearts right now \u2026\u00a0I\u2019ve been lost for words since we heard this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Akhi\u2019s mother is \u201cheartbroken\u201d over her first-born child\u2019s senseless death, Butler said.<\/p>\n

\u201cA tragedy like this never really struck the family where we lost a teenage,\u201d she said. \u201cA baby. That\u2019s her son!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Akhi<\/p>\n

GoFundMe<\/p>\n

Akhi Butler, 14, died in a subway surfing incident on the Williamsburg Bridge on Friday, police said. (GoFundMe)<\/p>\n

The family is still trying to understand how this could have happened.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m still questioning about this,\u201d Butler said. \u201cI don\u2019t even know the whole story. I\u2019m hearing bits and pieces.\u201d<\/p>\n

She wondered if peer pressure could have played a role.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was my concern, she said. \u201cAn 18-year-old was with a 14-year-old? Was he pressured? \u2026 But I don\u2019t know much on it, so I can\u2019t touch on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Butler called subway surfing a \u201cdangerous cycle\u201d that has been \u201cgoing on for years.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a thing when I was even at school,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Social media and TikTok have made the problem worse, Akhi\u2019s relatives believe.<\/p>\n

The victim\u2019s 23-year-old cousin, who asked that his name not be used, is reeling from the tragedy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe subway surfing thing, my opinion, I think these kids just want to do it for the thrill, for the moment, to go viral,\u201d the cousin said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSocial media nowadays, everybody want to be watched \u2026 You\u2019re risking your life, bro.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Subway<\/p>\n

Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Subway trains cross the Williamsburg Bridge. (Shutterstock)<\/p>\n

Akhi was \u201cbubbly\u201d and \u201cenergetic,\u201d with lots of active hobbies, including playing football and the drums.<\/p>\n

With the summer approaching he was excited to hit the pool at St. John\u2019s Recreation Center, across the street from the Crown Heights apartment where he lived with his mom and two younger siblings in the Albany Houses.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe loved swimming. He loved the rec center,\u201d Butler said. \u201cThat was one of his favorite go-to places, especially in the summertime.\u201d<\/p>\n

Relatives have launched a GoFundMe<\/a> to raise money for Akhi\u2019s funeral.<\/p>\n

Trains rumbling over the Williamsburg Bridge pass under a series of low-hanging beams, making it an especially hazardous location for an already dangerous activity.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a notorious hotspot spot. I nicknamed it the \u2018Death Bridge,\u2019\u201d said Michael, a former subway surfer who has since stopped. \u201cLow beams get everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michael, 21, said he gave up subway surfing in 2023 after his friend, 15-year-old Zachary Nazario, was killed riding a train over the same span where Akhi went down.<\/p>\n

In a similar incident last Oct. 4, two girls were found dead sprawled atop the last car of a J train after it crossed the Williamsburg Bridge and rolled into the Marcy Ave. station around 3:10 a.m. Each had suffered a severe head injury, apparently having been struck by a low-hanging beam on the bridge.\u2029One of the girls, 12-year-old Zemfira Mukhtarov<\/a>, was supposed to make brownies with her dad but sneaked out of the house instead, the grieving father told The News at the time.<\/p>\n

\"NEW<\/p>\n

Robert Nickelsberg\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The Williamsburg Bridge. (Photo by Robert Nickelsberg \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

NYC Transit President Demetrius Crichlow, in a statement Friday pleaded for people to keep teens from doing the \u201csuicidal stunts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is heartbreaking and knowing that riding outside trains is going to end tragically, it\u2019s incomprehensible \u2014 and pains me as a parent \u2014 that it continues to happen,\u201d Crichlow said.<\/p>\n

Over the past several months, cops and the MTA have taken a multiprong approach to discourage thrill seekers.<\/p>\n

Last June, the MTA ramped up its \u201cRide Inside and Stay Alive\u201d campaign featuring Queens-born BMX athlete Nigel Sylvester. The NYPD also began flying drones over aboveground subway lines to keep an eye out for subway surfers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The heartbroken family of a 14-year-old Brooklyn boy who died falling off the train while subway surfing over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,262,263,266,85,267,75,9,24,264,12,63,261,265],"class_list":["post-242609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-city","tag-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-manhattan","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-county","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-crime","tag-sub-county-region"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}