Cape Town - A distraught father has warned parents to be on the lookout for signs that their children are playing a deadly game after his daughter choked herself to death.
Kevin Moss, from Edgemead, only recently came to terms with how his daughter Jodi, 20, died after she was found dead in her apartment on May 20.
Moss said his daughter, a successful model, accidentally killed herself playing the “Choking Game”, also known as the “Pass Out” or “Black Out Challenge”.
“Jodi was a natural late sleeper and that day she didn’t answer her cellphone. Then her boyfriend decided to go to her flat and he found her,” Moss said.
Moss said it seemed his daughter had been doing this for some time.
He described Jodi as “a happy child” who never intended to kill herself. The model was found with the belt of her gown tangled around her neck. When her boyfriend arrived she was hanging on a metal pole, her lower body resting on the mattress.
“If I had known about it earlier I would’ve stopped it and knocked some sense into her,” Moss said.
He said he found home-made videos of Jodie on her computer after she died. They show her experimenting with the game from age 14.
Moss firmly believes his daughter did not intentionally try to kill herself.
“She was a young, beautiful girl with a thriving career as a model. To be honest it was a stupid thing to do,” he said.
Since his daughter’s death Moss has been trying to get his story out to caution parents about the dangerous game.
“I mean, you think you know your kids, but you don’t,” he said. He added that parents should always monitor their children.