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The bystander effect is a controversial psychological phenomenon where people fail to intervene in emergencies when others are present. Research has suggested that the likelihood of intervention decreases as the number of witnesses grows. This list highlights the quintessential example of this effect and provides nine particularly shocking instances.
10. The Parable of the Good Samaritan
To begin with, the quintessential example of the bystander effect. Jesus shares a parable with a lawyer who, in every other way, is deemed righteous in God's eyes. He follows the Ten Commandments and loves his neighbor as himself. Yet, he asks Jesus, 'Who is my neighbor?'
Through this parable, Jesus illustrates that everyone is a neighbor to everyone else and that assistance should be offered to anyone in need, regardless of their identity or background.
A Jew travels along the road and is attacked by bandits who beat him mercilessly, strip him of his clothing, and rob him, leaving him for dead. Later, a priest passes by, notices the wounded man, and crosses to the other side of the road, walking past without offering any help. Shortly after, a Levite sees him, avoids him, and continues on his way without intervening.
Then a Samaritan, whom the Jews consider an outcast, comes along, sees the man, and immediately takes action. He helps the injured man, transports him to a nearby inn, tends to his wounds, and pays the innkeeper to care for him.
'Which of these was the true neighbor to the Jew who was attacked by robbers?' Jesus inquires.
'The one who showed mercy,' answers the lawyer.
'Go and do the same.'
In the following nine instances, no one takes the same compassionate action.
9. Shanda Sharer
From January 10th to 11th, 1992, 12-year-old Shanda Sharer was kidnapped and subjected to horrific torture by four teenage girls: Laurie Tackett, Melinda Loveless, Hope Rippey, and Toni Lawrence. Tackett, who was seen as the ringleader, introduced the others to a dark subculture, including Goth, punk rock, vampirism, witchcraft, Satanism, and lesbianism. She orchestrated the plot to abduct Sharer and murder her as an act of revenge for allegedly stealing Loveless’s girlfriend.
They kidnapped Sharer from her home shortly after midnight, pretending they were taking her to meet their mutual friend, Amanda Heavrin, the girlfriend that Loveless believed Sharer had stolen. As soon as Sharer was in the car, Loveless held a knife to her throat and interrogated her about Heavrin, until they reached 'the Witch's Castle,' an abandoned house where local teens gathered.
Once inside, they bound Sharer and began discussing how to kill her. Sharer started crying in fear. They claimed to have been startled by headlights, so they drove her to a remote landfill in a dense forest, where Loveless beat her viciously with her fists. Lawrence and Rippey said they wanted to leave but were too scared to run or contact the police.
Loveless attempted to slit Sharer’s throat, but the knife was too dull. Rippey then got out of the car, had Loveless and Tackett restrain Sharer, and strangled her with a rope. Believing Sharer was dead, they put her in the trunk and went to Tackett's house to clean up. They heard Sharer's screams, and Tackett returned with a kitchen knife, covered in blood. The screams eventually ceased.
Tackett then performed a Wiccan ritual, using her runes to predict the girls' futures. At around 2:30 AM, Tackett and Loveless went joyriding, leaving Lawrence and Rippey behind at Tackett's house. Sharer, still in the trunk, fought to escape, prompting Tackett to stop the car and beat her unconscious with a tire iron.
They returned just before dawn and washed up again. Tackett laughed as she recounted her actions. The group then went to a local area for burning leaves and tree branches, where they showed the nearly lifeless Sharer, still locked in the trunk. Lawrence, disgusted, turned away but still refused to report her friends. Tackett sprayed Sharer with Windex, likely to worsen her injuries, and taunted her, saying, 'You're not looking so hot now, are you?'
They then filled a 2-liter Pepsi bottle with gasoline at a nearby station, drove to a remote field, laid the still-living Sharer on a blanket in the grass, drenched her, and set her on fire. Loveless returned shortly afterward, pouring the remaining gasoline on her to ensure her death.
At this point, Lawrence was terrified and finally contacted a friend to confess what had happened. She refused to call the police, fearing she would be implicated as an accomplice. Loveless became hysterical, regretting her actions, and called Amanda Heavrin to inform her. Heavrin initially didn’t believe them until she and another friend saw the bloodstained trunk of Tackett’s car and Sharer’s socks inside.
None of them contacted the authorities. Sharer’s body was discovered earlier that morning, on the 11th, by two hunters who reported it. By 8:00 PM, the entire community was aware, and Loveless finally confessed in a state of hysteria to the police. Tackett, Loveless, and Rippey received 60-year prison sentences, while Lawrence was sentenced to 20 years. Lawrence was released for good behavior in 2000, Rippey in 2006. Shockingly, Tackett was granted parole in 2018, and Loveless was released on parole in 2019.
8. Ilan Halimi
Ilan Halimi, a French Jew, was abducted in Paris by a group of Moroccan captors, who referred to themselves as 'barbarians,' on January 21, 2006. He was tortured for 24 days before succumbing to his injuries on February 13. Throughout this time, his captors, at least 20 individuals, subjected him to brutal beatings, particularly targeting his genitals, wrapped his head in duct tape leaving only his mouth uncovered for breathing and eating, stabbed him, burned his body and face with lighters and cigarettes, and broke his fingers in an attempt to extort a ransom of 450,000 Euros from his family. They stripped, scratched, and cut him with knives, before finally dousing him with gasoline and setting him on fire.
During the three weeks of Halimi's captivity, neighbors from the apartment building where the kidnappers resided could hear the disturbances and came to witness the horror. Despite this, no one called the police. A total of twenty-seven people have been charged with involvement in the crime, with nineteen convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. One of the torturer's fathers, Alcino Ribeiro, was aware of the situation but did nothing to intervene. He was sentenced to eight months but served no time, as his sentence was suspended.
The neighbors who merely watched the events unfold were not convicted, and most were not even indicted. On February 13, Halimi was discovered handcuffed and bound with nylon rope, naked, and left tied to a tree about 40 yards into a wooded area near a railway outside Paris. Over 80% of his body had been burned with acid and gasoline, making him nearly unrecognizable. He had severe bruises, blood blisters, and hematomas covering most of his body, leaving him more blue than flesh-colored, with multiple fractures, a missing ear, and a missing toe. His genitals were described as 'blackened oranges.' Halimi died on his way to the hospital.
The gang's 25-year-old leader, Youssouf Fofana, was apprehended in Abidjan 10 days after he had stabbed Halimi. In 2009, Fofana was found guilty of murder, acts of torture, and barbarism, with anti-Semitism as an aggravating factor. He is serving a life sentence with no possibility of parole for 22 years. Since then, Fofana has received additional sentences for new crimes, including attacking prison personnel and posting videos on YouTube from his cell, promoting anti-Semitic views and praising al-Qaeda.
7. Khaseen Morris and the Digital Age
On September 17, 2019, a tragic incident took the life of a 16-year-old high school student, Khaseen Morris, outside a strip mall in Long Island. After being seen walking with another boy's girlfriend, Morris was called to the location by several teens. Upon his arrival, he was immediately ambushed by a group of five. A violent brawl ensued, during which Morris was repeatedly stabbed in the chest and succumbed to his injuries later that night at the hospital.
The horrifying nature of Morris’s murder is compounded by the fact that it took place in broad daylight, with around 50 teenagers filming the incident on their phones. Despite being outnumbered and attacked by older, larger boys, no one came to his aid. The murder unfolded in a shocking and appalling void of compassion. In his final moments, Morris was left completely helpless, with no one offering assistance. Eventually, Tyler Flach, 18, and seven other teens were arrested and charged with Morris’s murder. Flach’s trial is currently underway, while the other seven face trials at a later date.
Numerous similar incidents take place every day, with most going unnoticed or ignored, as we act as ‘digital bystanders.’ While the Chicago sexual assault case sparked widespread outrage, many other videos highlighting the bystander effect have been ignored or, worse, gone viral. Some websites actively accept and publish videos of street violence filmed by bystanders, profiting from our collective apathy toward taking action when others are in need. These platforms have thus created a market where real-life violence is not only tolerated but celebrated and shared.
6. Kevin Carter’s Famous Photograph
Kevin Carter was a South African photojournalist who, in March 1993, captured one of the most infamous images of human suffering and neglect in sub-Saharan Africa. The photograph depicts a severely malnourished Sudanese toddler, alone and struggling to crawl toward an aid station. Behind her, a vulture waits patiently, poised to feast on her once she succumbs to death.
Carter later stated that he waited for 20 minutes hoping the vulture would spread its wings, believing this would make for a more compelling shot. When the vulture did not cooperate, he snapped the photo as it was. During those 20 minutes, the child rested, whimpering and panting, but Carter did nothing to intervene and assist her.
After taking the picture, Carter shooed the vulture away and left the girl to continue crawling toward her destination. Fortunately, she eventually reached the aid station. A journalist friend of Carter’s, Joao Silva, disputed this version, claiming the child's parents had only briefly left to collect food from a plane. Regardless, Carter admitted later that he simply 'didn’t want to get involved.' He went on to win a Pulitzer Prize for the photograph, but tragically took his own life the following year by carbon monoxide poisoning in his truck in Johannesburg.
5. Forced Relocation of the American Indians
This was not an isolated event; rather, the major injustices against Native Americans were driven by the same underlying motive. European settlers and their descendants sought more land, pushing the indigenous people further westward. In the process, they killed hundreds of thousands over the centuries, all to claim more space for themselves. Yet, no amount of land was ever enough for them. They continued to take more, depriving the Native Americans of their land, liberty, and their right to pursue happiness.
What is most staggering about this atrocity is that many prominent Americans, notably Andrew Jackson, viewed it as justified. They believed that because the Indians lacked the military strength to defend themselves, they had no right to retain their land. It was seen as a 'survival of the fittest' scenario. Jackson is directly responsible for the forced relocation of the Cherokee on the 'Trail of Tears.' In subsequent years, tribes like the Navajo and Sioux were decimated in brutal warfare.
From the Lost Colony in 1585 to the dawn of the 20th century, very few Europeans or their descendants raised any significant objections, if any, to the horrific treatment of an entire race of people. This disregard for human rights and dignity remained largely unchallenged.
4. Murders of Three Civil Rights Workers
If you've watched the film 'Mississippi Burning,' you're familiar with the tragic murders of James Chaney (African American), Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman (both white, Jewish). In 1964, members of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan shot them dead and concealed their bodies in an earthen dam. The outrage in the northern United States was swift and intense, as it should have been.
However, in the South, there was no public outcry. Few African Americans, particularly in Mississippi, dared to speak out against the crime, fearful of inciting the wrath of white authorities. Even more shocking was the lack of response from many white individuals, who either supported the crime or were indifferent to the suffering of blacks, Jews, and anyone who was not a 'WASP' in the South.
Racial hatred had become so entrenched that judges presiding over such cases rarely convicted those responsible, often delivering the lightest of sentences. The 17 individuals responsible for the 1964 murders were tried, but only 7 were convicted—not for murder, but for 'civil rights violations,' as the prosecution believed they couldn't secure a conviction for murder in Mississippi. The harshest sentence was 10 years for two of the offenders. Others received sentences of 7 or 3 years, but no one served more than 6.
3. The Holocaust
The most abhorrent and globally shameful event in human history gave rise to the notorious concept of 'diffusion of responsibility,' as all the Nazi officers tried at the Nuremberg Trials used the same defense: 'We were just following orders.'
They claimed that if the Holocaust was as catastrophic as the media reported, surely someone else must have been aware of it. Therefore, they believed it wasn't their responsibility to report the atrocities to the authorities.
Furthermore, they argued that the only authorities in continental Europe were German, and attempting to inform the outside world would have led to their own demise, without achieving any significant outcome. This argument is false. Most of the German population was unaware, but had they known, they could have come together to demand the Holocaust's cessation. The Nazis were unlikely to exterminate their own 'master race,' and by that time, the Allies would have learned of the atrocities. As a result, the Nazis cleverly kept the concentration and death camps hidden from all but the nearby villages.
Nevertheless, the Holocaust takes the top spot because the populations of the villages closest to these camps—Dachau, Buchenwald, Bergen-Belsen, Sachsenhausen, Mauthausen, and Ravensbrück, among others—were fully aware of the horrors taking place inside. The camps were situated near sizable towns and cities, where the locals could not possibly ignore the terrible stench emanating from them. Allied soldiers reported smelling the camps from up to 20 miles away when the wind was right.
The Allies accused the German citizens of these towns of knowing full well the fate of Jews and other 'undesirables' yet doing nothing to prevent it. These German communities were later forced to clean up the starved corpses and bury them in mass graves as punishment for their indifference.
2. The Incident at Richmond High School
The series of events that unfolded on the night of October 24, 2009, led me to create this list, and I must admit it has made me reconsider the severity of the crime highlighted in the #1 entry.
The victim's name has not been publicly disclosed as she is 15 years old, but the accounts of the crime are unanimous, and the details are shocking. For over two and a half hours, while the Homecoming Dance was being held inside the gym, around 10 men brutally assaulted the 15-year-old student, subjecting her to physical abuse the entire time. During this, another 10 individuals stood by, laughing and taking pictures with their cell phones.
The crowd eventually swelled to over 20 people, yet no one made the effort to contact the police. No one informed a security guard or an officer, despite several being present on campus. Not long before, the assistant principal had observed 12 to 15 adult men loitering near the crime scene, none of whom were wearing the required identification badges. These men did not appear to be students, yet the assistant principal did not notify the police or alert any staff. Instead, he returned to his duties, ignoring the situation altogether.
A local resident learned of the assault from her boyfriend and immediately contacted the authorities. The victim was discovered unconscious beneath a picnic table and was airlifted to a hospital in critical condition. She was discharged from the hospital on October 28th.
A witness described the assault: “They were kicking her in the head, beating her up, robbing her, and tearing off her clothes; it’s something that stays with you. I saw people treating her like she was less than human; I witnessed some truly disturbing things. She was eerily quiet; I thought she was dead for a moment, but then I saw her moving. I feel like I could have done something, but I don’t believe I’m responsible for what happened.”
It is believed that witnesses filmed the attack using their phones, but local law enforcement was unable to recover the footage. Nonetheless, arrests were made, and six men were incarcerated for their roles in the assault. Four of them pleaded guilty: Manuel Ortega received a 32-year sentence; Ari Morales was sentenced to 27 years; Elvis Torrentes and John Crane were sentenced to six and three years, respectively, after pleading guilty to lesser charges. Jose Montano and Marcelles Peter went to trial in 2013, where they were found guilty of forcible rape in concert, sexual penetration by force in concert, and forcible oral copulation in concert. Montano was sentenced to 33 years to life, while Peter was sentenced to 29 years to life. Their convictions and sentences were upheld in 2019.
1. Kitty Genovese
One of the most well-known instances of the bystander effect occurred on March 13, 1964, in Kew Gardens, Queens, New York, when Catherine Genovese returned to her apartment building around 3:15 AM after finishing her shift at work. She was attacked and stabbed twice in the back by Winston Moseley, a machine operator, who later stated that he simply ‘wanted to kill a woman.’
Genovese cried out, ‘Oh, my God! He stabbed me! Help me!’ and collapsed. Several neighbors in nearby buildings reported hearing her screams but dismissed them as likely the result of a drunken argument or a lover’s quarrel. One man yelled from his window, ‘Let that girl alone!’ which caused Moseley to briefly retreat.
One neighbor was certain they saw Genovese crawling across the street under a streetlight toward her apartment but made no effort to assist her. Witnesses saw Moseley leave in his car, only to return about 10 minutes later. He had changed his appearance, wearing a broader-brimmed hat to conceal his face. He searched for Genovese at the parking lot, train station, and apartment complex for another 10 minutes before finally locating her lying unconscious in a hallway at the back of the building, unable to get inside due to a locked door.
Moseley then proceeded to stab Genovese to death, inflicting multiple wounds to her hands and forearms, suggesting she had tried to fend him off. Ultimately, she succumbed to her injuries, and he raped her while she was dying. He stole around $50 from her and fled the scene. The entire ordeal lasted about 30 minutes.
The following day, a newspaper headline read ‘Thirty-eight Who Saw Murder Didn’t Call Police,’ which is not entirely accurate. Around 12 people later claimed to have witnessed the initial attack. Many of them explained they ‘just didn’t want to get involved.’ A simple call to the police could have made a difference, but everyone assumed that someone else would take action instead.
