Sue Jacquot was mid-livestream, playing Minecraft with her family to fund her grandson's cancer treatment, when police in tactical gear burst through her door. Someone had called 911 with a false report that the 81-year-old had been shot and killed.
The Queen Creek, Arizona resident, known online as GrammaCracker, found herself on the receiving end of a swatting attack, the latest in a string of criminal harassment cases where pranksters use fake emergency calls to send armed police responses to their targets' homes.
More than a dozen officers in full tactical gear responded to the false call. Jacquot said they entered her room and woke her up before escorting her out. "They just sort of escorted me out, and they were apologizing," she told KPNX. "I just wondered what my grandkids had done."
Her grandson Jack, 17, revealed the exact nature of the false report. "A call that Jack shot his grandma and killed her, and that he was going to kill himself," he said. "And right then, I was like, 'Whoa.' It was kind of like a punch to the stomach."
Jacquot started streaming Minecraft gameplay as a bonding activity with her family. When Jack was diagnosed with a rare form of sarcoma cancer, she pivoted the channel into a fundraiser, directing all ad revenue toward his treatment costs. Playing alongside Jack and another grandson, Austin, she accumulated hundreds of thousands of subscribers eager to support the cause. A GoFundMe campaign supplemented the streaming revenue.
That visibility, however, came with a dark side. Police are now investigating the swatting incident, which the family believes was a deliberate act tied to the public nature of their fundraising effort.
Despite the harrowing experience, Jacquot has refused to be intimidated. "They're not going to tell me what I can do. They're not going to make me afraid to do that," she said of continuing her gaming streams.
Author James Rodriguez: "Swatting is criminal harassment dressed up as a prank, and targeting a grandmother raising money to save her grandson's life crosses a line that law enforcement needs to pursue hard."
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