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A Minnesota woman has been charged with manslaughter after she shot and killed her boyfriend as part of the pair’s attempt to become YouTube celebrities.
According to court documents, Monalisa Perez called 911 on June 26 at around 6:30pm local time to say that she had shot Pedro Ruiz III. The two had set up two video cameras to capture Perez firing the gun at Ruiz while he held a book in front of his chest. Ruiz apparently convinced Perez that the book would stop the bullet from a foot away. The gun, a Desert Eagle .50 caliber pistol, was not hindered by the book.
[...] A video filmed the day before the shooting features Perez excitedly imagining what would happen when the couple reached 300,000 subscribers on their YouTube channel.
According to a Star Tribune report citing a nearby television station in North Dakota, the shooting took place near the couple's home as their three-year-old daughter was nearby. An aunt of Ruiz, who was not named by WDAY-TV, was quoted as saying that she knew what they planned to do and that she tried to talk them out of it.
The aunt said Ruiz replied, "'Because we want more viewers. We want to get famous.'"
Perez, 19, was released on bail on Wednesday. She is pregnant with the couple's second child.
Further details from The New York Times:
Ms. Perez told investigators that she had shot Mr. Ruiz from about a foot away while he held a 1.5-inch thick book to his chest, the authorities said. She described using a firearm that matched the pistol that was found at the scene.
Mr. Ruiz had been “trying to get her” to fire the gun “for a while,” Ms. Perez told investigators, according to court documents. They state that he had set up one camera on the back of a vehicle and another on a ladder to capture the stunt.
To help persuade her to pull the trigger, Mr. Ruiz had even shown Ms. Perez a book that he had previously shot himself, she told investigators. In that case, she said, the bullet had not gone all the way through the text.
See also: CNN.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Lagg on Monday July 03 2017, @02:29PM (3 children)
I typed up a long post about guns and social media and stupid people taking advantage of both to direct other people to make guns extremely unfun for me and the rest of the responsible people. But meh.
Anyway, someone named Markiplier committed a potential felony (if it was connected to an alarm, and at best a bannable offense from the business) by doing some kind of retard-pose in an elevator a while back and "accidentally" (purposefully) hit his head on the button that pulls the alarm. The responses thought this was adorable and completely okay/normal. This wasn't on YT even though he's a letsplayer. It was twitter because he's a self-serving cunt that felt like building his base (familiar).
I can't imagine someone doing this under normal circumstances if the incentive wasn't there. Or they're downright insane (also familiar). No one criticized him, tweet got pushed down and forgotten, he probably gained a few thousand followers. And this is just some stupid letsplayer that records video games. People like schadenfreude and all that. I honestly don't know which party is the one at blame here now. Between enabling viewers, youtube or these two themselves. I mean it's a two way street. People on social media feed on each other parasitically.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 03 2017, @04:45PM (2 children)
The alarm button in an elevator is pretty much always connected to something because the last thing we want is for people trapped in an elevator to think they're forgotten. That's when they try to pry the doors open and potentially fall down the shaft. There may be a small number left from the olden days, but as a general rule, if you're in an elevator, there is some sort of intercom installed.
It's not criminal to push it, it's just bad manners. You push the button and either building security or the elevator company responds. I'm not aware of them ever calling 911 directly as the fire department isn't trained to deal with the problems causing an elevator to get stuck.
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Monday July 03 2017, @05:12PM
Only experience I have with the e button in an elevator is hearing the loud ring. Since I'm not an idiot and don't go around pressing them. But good to know I won't have to deal with explaining to the fire dept. what happened if I ever get stuck in an elevator. Especially if it's a really silly reason.
I didn't consider the staff though for some reason. I bet they were real happy about having to reset the thing (or whatever they do) for the benefit of a staged photo.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 05 2017, @08:54AM
I don't think it's rude. I press those buttons once in a while to test that someone is actually paying attention. I don't hold it down for very long. If someone responds I tell that person that I'm just testing. About half the time someone responds.
What's bad manners is nobody responded to this guy for 41 hours: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/man-trapped-elevator-41-hours/story?id=4693690 [go.com]