FAIRFAX, Va. — Two teenagers in Northern Virginia have been charged over a prank video that startled several people in early March, according to Fairfax City Police.
Bystanders reported seeing someone with duct tape over their mouth and wrists bound inside a trunk while two people were outside the car and “assumed control” in the parking lot of Lowe’s on Jermantown Road.
“It appears that two subjects have a male in the back of a trunk tied up,” audio from police dispatch calls said. “Someone is asking them to stop.”
However, police said everyone involved were acquaintances recording a prank video for YouTube.
The alleged incident took place on March 5. While police already charged 19-year-old Colin Harris of Sterling for disorderly conduct and falsely summoning law enforcement three days later, they just announced charges Thursday against the second person involved, 19-year-old Ahadu Geta of Falls Church.
Investigators said the two 19-year-old men were trying to make a disturbance in public and illicit a police response.
“I know that some customers were upset about it,” Lowe’s employee Matt Novitsky said. “I think it made people uncomfortable.”
“It doesn't make sense to me that they're doing that,” a customer said. “They should study besides doing what they're not supposed to do.”
Police issued a summons to both of the suspects. They didn’t appear in the adult detention center but are expected to appear in court pending a hearing.
“I think people are taking it too far especially with stuff like that,” Novitsky added. “People don't know it's a prank. They get scared. They're going to react and might turn south real quick.”
In Loudoun County last year, Tanner Cook was shot while trying to record a prank video on Alan Colie inside Dulles Town Center Mall. A jury acquitted Colie on the most serious charge after his attorneys argued self-defense.
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