A YouTuber, Trevor Jacob has been jailed for six months for deliberately crashing his plane for views, and also lying about it to the United States investigators.
The 30 years old man posted the video of the plane crash in December 2021, implying it was an accident. He ejected from the plane , with a selfie stick in hand and parachuted down to land.
The video clip was viewed millions of times.
In a plea agreement, Jacob said he filmed the video as part of a product sponsorship deal.
He pleaded guilty earlier this year to one felony count of destruction and concealment with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation.
The federal prosecutors in California, on Monday, said “Jacob most likely committed this offence to generate social media and news coverage for himself and to obtain financial gain
“Nevertheless, this type of ‘daredevil’ conduct cannot be tolerated,”
In a statement, Jacob said that “this experience has been so humbling” and described the sentence as the “right decision”.
In November 2021, Jacob left a Santa Barbara, California, airport on a solo flight with cameras mounted on his plane. He also took with him, a parachute, as well as a selfie stick.
The US Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said “He did not intend to reach his destination, but instead planned to eject from his aircraft during the flight and video himself parachuting to the ground and his airplane as it descended and crashed”
“After the plane crashed into the Los Padres National Forest 35 minutes after take-off, Jacob hiked to the site and recovered the footage.
He then uploaded the video entitled “I crashed my airplane” to YouTube on 23 December, which contained a promotion for a wallet company.”
Some viewers were sceptical of the crash, noting that Jacob was already wearing a parachute and made no attempt to land the plane safely.
He reported the crash to the National Transportation Safety Board, who said he was responsible for preserving the wreckage. Jacob later claimed he did not know the location of the site.
The video racked up almost three million views before it was removed.
Chioma Kalu
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