YouTuber wanted to steal ‘like a joke’ and was killed

Timothy wilks, a 20-year-old young man, was killed last Friday in an event that took the entire United States apart. They shot him in the parking lot of Urban Air, an adventure park and trampolines, located in the city of Nashville, Tennessee, after having filmed with his friend a robbery as a “joke” for his channel Youtube.

As reported by the media Sun, Wilks jumped on people with fake butcher knives, in an attempt to record his terrifying reactions for a YouTube video. One of those strangers was David starnes, who, from what he said, He didn’t know it was a joke, he pulled out a gun and shot the boy.

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In statements to prosecutors handling the case, Starnes argued that “Used the weapon as a measure of self-defense”, because he could not verify the veracity of the knives. Until, there is no charge against him. However, its outlook is very complicated, not only because of the tragic end of this story but also given that an investigation is underway to find out if he had a license to carry firearms.

What are “thieves’ pranks” about

The “Thieves Pranks”, or in Spanish “robos en joke”, are a “challenge” or a challenge in which YouTubers participate they claim theft on public roads or, directly, they steal from people, to which, when the camera is turned off, their personal effects are returned. The purpose of this is record the reactions and upload them to the various streaming platforms.

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Although not fully accepted by the virtual community, some of the videos are very popular, mainly in the United States. If we add the number of views of the first three videos that appear in the YouTube search box when using the term, we’d be surprised if they had over 30 million.

Often these jokes do not generate any consequences for those who perform them, but there are times when yes. In August 2020, Alan and Alex Stokes, some YouTubers better known as “Stoke Twins”, have been charged with felony crimes in California for this series of ‘pranks’. Indeed, during the filming of one of the videos, the police thought they were thieves and instead of clarifying the situation, they pointed a so-called fake gun at an Uber driver.

Eventually, the officers held them back for a while, but let them go. Improper, a few hours later the brothers did the same again. They went out into the street dressed entirely in black and with bags full of money. But this time everything would be different. They were arrested and charged in court.

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