Swat Team Storms Actor’s House During Livestream

An actor known for his work on the popular video game “Grand Theft Auto 5,” was swatted during a livestream on Thursday.

Ned Luke, the voice actor of main character Michael De Santa in “GTA 5,” was swatted during a YouTube livestream of himself playing the video game for fans on Thanksgiving Day.

I can't believe some kids on the internet actually called the cops and swatted Ned Luke (Michael from GTA V). He's just started streaming and I swear he's the sweetest actor ever, this is just disturbing and the government should take action against this behavior pic.twitter.com/oU3Y72nHM0

— NikTek (@NikTekOfficial) November 23, 2023

The actor took a phone call apparently warning him before he abruptly ended his stream.

From Fox News:

“I gotta go,” Luke, who has over 60,000 YouTube subscribers, said during the livestream. “Now these a–holes have swatted my house, so I gotta go.”

Swatting — when someone makes a false 911 report eliciting a hefty and aggressive police response — has become more common over the last decade as it becomes easier for callers to conceal identities with masked voices and spoofed phone numbers or IP addresses. The FBI created a nationwide database this year due to the apparent rise in hoax calls, recording over 200 swatting incidents between May 1 and Sept. 21, according to the FBI.

#ICYMI: #FBI Boston sat down with @GMA to discuss an increase in "swatting" – fake threats phoned into police about active shooters, bombs, or violence in progress. Watch this report to learn about what the FBI is doing to try & combat this costly crime: https://t.co/C2BihMvgNO pic.twitter.com/zth9Gg6ufL

— FBI Boston (@FBIBoston) November 14, 2023

“The FBI takes swatting very seriously because it puts innocent people at risk,” a FBI spokeperson told Fox News in September. “We will continue to work with our local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to gather, share, and act upon threat information as it comes to our attention.”

The hoax calls were not officially tracked before the database’s inception, but a former FBI agent, Kevin Kolbye, estimated swatting incidents jumped from 400 in 2011 to over 1,000 in 2019, according to an Anti-Defamation League report.

Hours after the swatting incident, Luke responded on X to accusations that Rockstar Games, “GTA’s” publisher, didn’t mask the IP addresses of its players.

Y’all jumping to some large ass conclusions. This had nothing to do with Rockstar. These assholes leaked my private info years ago and have been doing this shit since. Anyone’s info is available online if you are sick enuff to really wanna find it. 🤷🏼

— Ned Luke (@ned_luke) November 24, 2023

Darren Watkins Jr., a YouTube star with nearly 22 million subscribers known as “IShowSpeed,” was also swatted while livestreaming on Monday. He stepped away from his computer to go downstairs, warning viewers about his safety before going off camera. Viewers could see three armed police officers walking through his home afterward.

“I just got swatted. I wish I knew whoever did that,” Watkins said on Snapchat after the incident. “That’s f—ed up. Don’t ever do that again in your life, bro.”

Some of the hoax threats have even turned deadly. A false report leading to an armed police response, for example, led a cop to shoot and kill a Kansas man in 2017.