Zackery Died After Climbing on Top of a Subway Train. Who Is to Blame?

Zackery Nazario died after climbing on top of a moving train in Brooklyn. He was just 15 years old. But why did Nazario get on top of a train in the first place? Callie Holtermann’s reporting dives into the culture of subway surfing—people riding atop trains to film risky stunt videos that proliferate on TikTok and Instagram despite being explicitly forbidden. Nazario, who was constantly online, was drawn into this culture, and according to his mother, the platforms hosting this content should now be blamed for his death.

At 6:45 p.m., Zackery climbed between cars of a Brooklyn-bound J train and was struck in the head by a low beam while turning around to look at his girlfriend, according to court filings. He fell between subway cars and was run over by the train.

Zackery died while doing something that he had been posting about on social media for months. On Instagram, he’d documented himself clinging to the back of a train cab as it sped through the Prospect Avenue stop in Brooklyn, and striking a swaggering pose for the camera while standing on top of a J train that was approaching the Williamsburg Bridge.

He tagged friends who were part of the same online community as him, one in which teenagers posted short films that in Hollywood would require professional stunt performers. The exercise can be lethal: Seven people died last year while riding on the outside of trains, according to the N.Y.P.D. The youngest was 11.