Anakin Zehring, Kansas Teen, Paralyzed After His Daughter's Father Shot Him Over 'Senior Assassin' Trend in Walmart Parking Lot

A high school student was left paralyzed from the waist down when a furious father shot him in a Walmart parking lot after the teen fired a toy gun at the man's daughter in a controversial trend .

Anakin Zehring, 18, was in a car with two other men outside a Walmart in Goddard, Kansas, on May 11 when they spotted two teenagers walking toward the building and proceeded to shoot car with gel guns, according to the Wichita Eagle.

A passenger inside the car shouted “I'm your main assassin” as the two teenagers – a girl and her boyfriend – were shot multiple times with water-filled polymer pellets.

“Senior Assassin” is an elaborate tag game, in which participating high school students are assigned a “target” and are usually asked to record the “tag” of their victims and post it on social media outside of school .

Most games consist of players using water guns, water balloons, or a gel gun, as seen in Zehring's case.

Several police departments warned parents earlier this year that this nationwide game could have deadly consequences.

The couple claimed they were shot with multiple bullets before running inside to escape the shooting, according to KWCH.

Once inside, the girl called her father, Ruben Marcus Contreras, to tell him they had been shot with gel guns and that she didn't know who the teens were.

The girl's boyfriend, named only as “GB” in the police affidavit about the incident, confronted the teens and met one of them using an expletive and “then told him to meet in the back of the Walmart,” the outlet reported.

The teens, who had parked their car, attempted to enter the Walmart, but were kicked out and headed to a nearby Dairy Queen.

When Contreras arrived at the store, his daughter pointed at the teens who were getting back into their car, a Chevrolet Spark.

The furious father ran across the parking lot as Zehring backed up and confronted the teen, attempting to open the driver's side door.

Contreras' daughter, identified as “SC,” said she saw her father walk toward the car and lower his head “because she was afraid of what might happen to her father.”

The frightened girl heard a “loud noise” before watching the blue spark fly away and crash into shipping containers.

“(Contreras) gets back into the driver's side of the Spark and appears to pull out a firearm from the right side of his waistband,” a detective with the Sedgwick County Sheriff's Office wrote in the affidavit obtained by the Wichita Eagle.

“(Contreras) has the firearm in his right hand and sticks his right hand into the open driver's side rear seat window. That’s when (Contreras) fired a bullet at the vehicle.

Contreras was armed with a Smith and Wesson 9mm handgun.

In his affidavit, Zehring told police he thought Contreras was just a pedestrian crossing the parking lot and only stopped for the crosswalk.

“Zehring said his ears started ringing and he realized he had been shot. Zehring said he turned west and realized he couldn't feel his legs,” a detective wrote. “Zehring said he hit a pole in the parking lot to stop the Spark because he didn't want to hit anyone on the road.”

The Goddard High School graduate also told police that he was not the one who fired the gel gun, a claim that was contradicted as one of the passengers told authorities that Zehring was the shooter.

The single shot left Zehring with serious injuries, as it “pierced his duodenum (upper part of the small intestine) and damaged his spinal cord, causing loss of sensation from the waist down,” his colleagues wrote. parents on a GoFundMe.

“The bullet caused significant damage to his body, requiring the fusion of his L1, L2 and L3 spinal bones,” Kenly Zehring and Jeremy Zehring added.

The teen was initially hospitalized at St. Francis in Wichita in critical condition before being transferred to Madonna Rehabilitation Center in Omaha, Nebraska.

Contreras was arrested on May 15 and charged with attempted first-degree murder, according to KSN.

He was booked into the Sedgwick County Detention Center on $300,000 bail and is currently free on bond.