Nine-year-old’s discovery of mystery phone under family’s carpet sparks rabid speculation on TikTok

Nine-year-old Grayson Crawford unexpectedly found an unclaimed cell phone under the carpeted stairs of his home, launching what’s now become a viral mystery on TikTok .

Grayson’s mom, Dee Crawford, took to her social media account on July 26, revealing the puzzling item wedged under the carpet. In the video, which has now garnered over 3.3 million views on TikTok, Dee explained how Grayson stuck his hand in the space between the carpet and the stairs where he found what he thought was an “iPhone.”

According to his mom, Grayson’s curiosity often gets the best of him. “He’s always looking into and touching things and snooping. He’s always aware of everything,” she noted.

In this case, Grayson unknowingly retrieved an LG Shine. Of course, Grayson jumped for joy, thinking he’d got his hands on an Apple phone before his mom corrected him.

At first, Dee wasn’t sure what kind of phone the pre-teen had found and where it came from. When she showed her husband, he assumed Dee had bought it from Goodwill and Grayson purposefully hid it in the steps. But according to Dee, she hadn’t ever seen the device, which begged the question: Where did it come from?

“I wouldn’t buy a phone that was so beat up and Grayson has the memory of an elephant. He’d definitely remember if he’d seen the phone before, so he’s my testament that I’m not forgetting anything,” Dee confessed.

Dee’s family contacted the previous homeowners to ask if it was their phone, but they had no knowledge of it.

It wasn’t until August 18 that Dee and her husband finally turned on the phone after having their “techy friend do some surgery” on it.

Then, a few days later, Dee posted a follow-up video on TikTok, exposing the spicy message she found in the phone’s “sent” inbox. The text hints at a sexual relationship between a friend of the phone owner and someone named Atticus.

Viewers were sent into a frenzy after this, guessing the phone belonged to a “millenial” who would soon freak out over their intimate messages being exposed.

“There is some elder millenial out there that is going to come across this video and absolutely panic,” one TikTok user wrote, while another thought the owner was “having an affair with the previous owner” of the house.

Another deep dive into the phone resulted in a freaky image of a dog who allegedly looked exactly like Dee’s old family rescue dog, Clark. Dee showed her followers the dog from the phone pictures and the photos she kept of Clark.

“The resemblance is crazy,” Dee claimed.

On September 6, Dee contacted an individual listed under “ICE Mom” in the mystery phone. Dee had figured out the number associated with the device by searching through the contact list.

When she spoke with “ICE Mom,” the woman was initially skeptical of Dee trying to scam her. But after some convincing, the woman reluctantly gave her some information.

According to Dee’s September 30 video, “ICE Mom” thought the phone belonged to her daughter, who used to live behind Dee’s house. However, after the daughter looked through Dee’s TikTok videos to examine the pictures and messages she exposed, the daughter said the phone wasn’t hers. In fact, she said the phone was her sister’s and her sister didn’t want it back.

“That’s odd. I’d want my phone back and would wanna know how it got there,” one person commented on the video.

“So my buddy said he knows how it got there. It was a stolen phone. Battery was removed to keep it from being tracked,” another speculated.

Another more sympathetic viewer added: “I get it. I’m a private person- you’ve showed messages and stuff to the whole world from the phone. I would want nothing to do with it even if it is from many years ago.”