President Biden spoke Monday with a Kansas City teenager who was shot after he rang the wrong doorbell and wished him a “speedy recovery,” the White House said.
Biden spoke on the phone with 16-year-old Ralph Yarl and his family and “prayed for Ralph’s health and justice,” the boy’s lawyers said.
The highschool student is currently recovering at home after miraculously surviving a shot to the head when he mistakenly rang the doorbell of the house where he thought he was supposed to pick up his younger twin brothers on Thursday.
Prosecutors said the homeowner, 84-year-old Andrew Lester, shot the teenager twice through his front door.
Lester was charged with first-degree assault and armed crime Monday and will spend the rest of his life in prison, the Clay County Prosecutor’s Office announced just after the presidential subpoena.
Clay County Prosecutor Zachary Thompson said investigators imagine there was a “racial element” to the shooting, but didn’t elaborate on details.
Lester, who is white, allegedly shot the black teenager once in the head and once in the shoulder with a .32 caliber revolver.
He faces 10 to 30 years behind bars or life in prison if convicted.
The bond was set at $200,000.
![Ralph Yarl was shot and injured by the homeowner after he mistakenly went to the wrong house to pick up his siblings.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/2023-04-18T002157Z_208966978_RC2IG0A9QDOR_RTRMADP_3_MISSOURI-SHOOTING.jpg?w=1024)
Lawyer of the Yarla family told Tom Llamas of NBC News that the teenager was “in seventh heaven” after talking to the president, who he said invited him to the White House.
“Ralph just spoke to the president of the United States tonight,” lawyer Lee Merritt said.
“So he had a week-long gale. On Thursday he was confronted with lethal force and shot in the head and recovered, on Saturday he was released from the hospital in stable condition … And as I said, he had a possibility to talk to the White House and the President of the United States and get some direct encouragement.”
![President Biden was able to speak to Ralph Yarl as well as pray for the 16-year-old as he recovers.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Biden_Canada_81287-234d6.jpg?w=1024)
Merritt said Biden also spoke to the highschool student about his musical talents. Relations have described Yarl as “one of the best base clarinetists in Missouri.”
The president told Yarl that his father also played the clarinet.
According to his aunt, Yarl plays in the school’s jazz and competition band, and recently earned recognition from the Missouri All-State Band with honors.
![Andrew D. Lester was charged with the shooting of Ralph Yarl.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/NYPICHPDPICT000009780215.jpg?w=750)
“Ralph can often be found with a musical instrument. He loves all of them,” his aunt Faith Spoonmore wrote on the GoFundMe page she created to provide medical take care of her nephew.
Vice President Kamala Harris also addressed the senseless violence in Monday’s tweet and offered her prayers to Yarl as he recovers.
“Let’s be clear: no child should ever live in fear of being shot for pressing the wrong doorbell.
Every child deserves safety. That is the America we fight for,” Harris wrote on Twitter.
Yarl’s attorneys praised the prosecution for filing charges against Lester on Monday after slamming authorities the day before for failing to immediately arrest the shooter.
“While that is definitely a step in the right direction, we are going to proceed to fight for Ralph while he strives for a full recovery.