On quiet Sequoyah County backroads near Muldrow, the dings and the dents covering dozens of mailboxes are some of the damage left behind by teenage boys who had too much time on their hands Monday night.
"We just wanted to go out and have some fun and we ended up going out and doing something we weren't supposed to be doing," Dalton McNealy said.
The Sequoyah County Sheriff's Department reports they caught four teenage boys after they vandalized around 70 mailboxes with a baseball bat, Monday evening.
On Thursday, the somewhat average crime took a rare turn. McNealy and his friend, Jeffrey Collins, went knocking on the doors of their victims. Collins said he had been with McNealy and two other teenagers on Monday night.
"Hey sir, a few nights ago we was hitting mailboxes and we hit yours," McNealy told one man. "I would like to apologize for it."
McNealy also publicly apologized on Wednesday. The Sequoyah County Sheriff's Department wrote about the crime on its Facebook page, asking anyone with damage to report it. McNealy posted his own message.
"I'm truly sorry and can assure you that this will never happen again and that I'm truly remorseful for the mistakes that I have made," he read from his post on the sheriff's Facebook page.
Then Sheriff Ron Lockhart wrote a reply to McNealy.
"It takes a big person to apologize like you just did," he wrote. "I want you to know that everyone makes mistakes and no one is perfect. Learn from this mistake and move forward and get your education and make something of yourself."
On Thursday Lockhart talked with 2 Works For You.
"In my 30 years I have never seen anyone apologize like he did," Lockhart said. "Of course they did wrong. Of course he did wrong, what they did is not acceptable and they will be dealt with in the court of law."
Lockhart said after the remorse two of the teens are showing, he hopes he will never have to deal with them again. All four teens, he said, will now be dealt with through the juvenile affairs division of the county court.
McNealy said his public post and going door-to-door was his own idea, not an idea from his parents. He lost his mother nine years ago and his father also died three months ago after a battle with cancer.
"I was in the wrong of doing it," he said of damaging the mailboxes. "It was their property, we had no right bashing in their mailboxes at all."
Collins doesn't expect the court system to give them any less of a punishment, even though they're apologizing to the property owners.
"I feel like we should have to pay and fix the mailboxes," Collins said.
The teenagers are due in court Tuesday, May 17.
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