Social media influencers can go to any lengths for content. And in a similar instance, Ayin Tussupov, with 1.2M followers on Instagram, had recently attempted to prank an uber driver for ‘views.’ However, what he got in return was a jail term of three and a half years. Yes, that’s right!
As seen in the viral clip, Tussupov and two others initially sit down in the car and ask the driver to open the trunk and help their friend load the shopping bags. After the taxi driver gets down to do so, one of the bloggers quickly sneaks in behind the wheel and drives away.
They return a few minutes later and inform the driver that it was indeed a prank. However, too late for them as by then, the latter already informs the police of the incident. The entire episode has been captured by one of Tussupov’s mates on camera.
The court, in its ruling on the matter, said, “Dumshebay E., Tusupov A., Khasanov R. N. were found guilty of committing a crime under paragraph 2 of Article 166 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, and they were sentenced to real imprisonment, for a period of three years and six months, with serving punishment in a general regime penal colony.”
The influencers will be sent to a prison camp roughly 500km from Moscow and would be required to put up in gulag-style facilities. As reported, these prisons generally house around 800 inmates (with barracks of around 100 to 120 people) and include bunk beds and rooms that are built to hold 50 or 60 people at max. Further, they only have one bathroom with one toilet and one sink per barrack.
Well, we hope some lessons were learnt here!
