Parents of Boy Thrown at Mall of America to Suspect: ‘You Chose to Listen to the Worst Parts of Yourself’

Emmanuel Aranda, who threw a 5-year-old boy over a Mall of America balcony, listens as Judge Jeannice Reding hands out a 19-year sentence at the Hennepin County Government Center in Minneapolis, Minn., on June 3, 2019. Elizabeth Flores/Star Tribune via AP

The mother and father of a 5-year-old boy who was thrown from the balcony at Minnesota’s Mall of America released a statement to the suspect, Emmanuel Aranda.

On June 3, Aranda was sentenced to 19 years in prison for attempted murder. Investigators said that in the attack, Aranda went to the mall looking for someone to kill before he grabbed the boy, Landen, who was with his mother and friends.