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YouTuber who staged plane crash faces up to 20 years jail

460 points by tafda 3y ago

tintedfireglass 3y ago
Just a small question. Why does crashing a plane cause such a huge discussion and such an impressive sentence? unless someone causes damage to any public or private property while crashing the plane it's a harmless thing to do. Who is it hurting and why is the YouTuber punished?Curious.
- skobovm 3y ago
  There are probably many reasons for this, but here’s my take: the GA community is largely self-policing. There are dozens of regs one could break — whether it’s 8 hours bottle to throttle or busting VFR cloud mins — however the pilot community adheres to them almost religiously. To have someone so blatantly and publicly violate regs with a complete disregard for safety and property would be setting a terrible precedent for the FAA. Additionally, this is in the best interests of the GA community as a whole, given that it always has been and will continue to be under scrutiny from the general public. No one wants there to be the perception that among them there is a 100LL cowboy who’s gonna bust through a bravo, slam a red bull, and ditch their plane over a neighborhood. The hammer needs to come down, and it needs to come down hard.
dmitrygr 3y ago
Curiously, the charge he pled guilty to as part of the plea deal has nothing to do with planes. He pled guilty to obstructing a federal investigation (of the crash). Makes sense. Proving his intent w.r.t. the crash back then would be harder than proving that he DID remove the wreck and subsequently destroyed it.
- mc32 3y ago
  I dunno. I believe the guy is guilty and should be punished for recklessness, etc. but I don’t like it when authorities rely on indirect charges to “get” someone. Prove the original crime, don’t rely and peripheral procedure like “they lied to a federal agent” (uhh) cop-out. Do your job. Likewise I’m not don’t of people getting off on “technicalities” (Some more than others)
  - dfadsadsf 3y ago
    Fully agree. After how obstruction of justice without underlying crime was used in political trials recently, I would fully support either removing or substantially increasing bar for it to be a crime.
    - mempko 3y ago
      I'm not aware of any political trials. Which trials are you referring to?
  - sgjohnson 3y ago
    > Prove the original crime The evidence of which was destroyed?
    - rain1 3y ago
      "I Crashed My Airplane" - TrevorJacob https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM
      - sgjohnson 3y ago
        Yes, obviously the FAA/NTSB/whatever agency needed the remains of that plane to prove their case that the crash landing was staged. I don't think that the video alone gets past the reasonable doubt standard.
        mc32 3y ago
        What’s the angle? The fuselage doesn’t crumple one way if it’s staged and another way if it was an accident. The metal and construction materials cannot know intent.
        sgjohnson 3y ago
        It should still be possible to find out if there was a problem with the engine before the crash.
zerohp 3y ago
Good. Make an example out of him.
- deleted 3y ago
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- dang 3y ago
  Ok, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to HN. We want curious conversation here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- keyme 3y ago
  Why? In all, the original crime is equivalent to dumping a big piece of trash in the forest. Faking stuff for youtube is not a crime. Obstructing an unnecessary investigation is a big deal only because people fear-mongered us to believe it's a big deal. Guy should get a good slap and a 6 figure fine. Not get his life taken away.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Alupis 3y ago
    > Why? In all, the original crime is equivalent to dumping a big piece of trash in the forest It's a bit more serious than that. It worked out to not harm anyone or do large-scale damages (fire, destruction, etc) this time, but it was still wildly dangerous and demonstrated a complete lack and disregard for aviation safety and rules. A more apt comparison would be throwing a table off the Empire State Building, and it just so happened to not hit anything below.
    - PinkRidingHood 3y ago
      I'm reading about the "extensive planning enhancement" here on comments and I'm wondering why that would've got him more prison time... If he picked a time where there was no one and a spot to crash the plane where it wouldn't have started a fire (he probably didn't want to kill anyone), wouldn't it have been a less harmful act? I'm just saying, the "potential to cause harm" is vague here, it could be equivalent to throwing down a table off the Empire State Building according to careful physics calculations and precisely avoid killing anybody. It's still harmful (because the calculations can be incorrect), but less so. (honestly had he not destroyed the evidence and made the plea that he constructed the crash in a way that was designed not to harm anyone, and it ended up not harming anyone, I suspect he might've gotten a lower sentence)
thrill 3y ago
Harsh, but fair.
- valine 3y ago
  Feels overly harsh considering no one was hurt. Send him to jail for a year for obstructing the investigation. It’s not like he’s going to do this again.
  - silisili 3y ago
    But they could have been hurt, especially if he kicked off a wildfire or landed on some unsuspecting party. I mean, we charge people for hiring a hitman, or shooting at someone and missing, even though in both cases nobody is necessarily harmed. 20 years may be excessive, but I'm not sure 'was anyone actually hurt' is a good sentencing guideline either.
    - ALittleLight 3y ago
      In those cases the intent would be to cause harm. Here the intent was not to cause harm, it was just a reckless and bad thing to do.
      - silisili 3y ago
        That's a very fair point. I guess the question then is how we should treat recklessness with potential to harm, as there definitely should be a deterrent for that. But perhaps not as much as my examples.
        Alupis 3y ago
        We treat drunk drivers harshly, even if they harmed no one. The potential for harm, body and property, combined with the complete disregard for safety (aviation and otherwise) and federal aviation laws/regulations, from someone who had a high level of training (as required for all private pilots) makes it really hard to excuse.
hammyhavoc 3y ago
People do some bizarre stuff in the name of clickbait.
- 404mm 3y ago
  Sweet, sweet juicy internet points!!
  - mabbo 3y ago
    And also the sponsorship he had with some wallet company.
    - MBCook 3y ago
      It’s too bad something can’t be done to them. They probably didn’t know. And if they did it would probably be incredibly hard to prove. Just doesn’t seem like anyone involved in any way should walk away without at least some punishment.
      - hammyhavoc 3y ago
        Well, if you sponsor a YouTuber to do a brand placement and he goes and does something drastic that wasn't in the contract, should you be punished? You're the victim too, he brought negative press to your doorstep brand-wise.
        MBCook 3y ago
        I think there’s no way to practically do what I want. I don’t think it would work out. I just sort of feel like there should be some sort of incentive to help ensure this kind of stuff doesn’t happen. If you have a contract that explicitly says what the person is supposed to do and they don’t, then it seems like you have a good defense to me. On the other hand if you have a contract that says something along the lines of “do something that gets 1 million views and will pay you $200,000” then I feel like you should be liable. I really dislike the current trend of people just doing extreme stuff to try to get views. A few people have been killed, it’s kind of amazing the number isn’t higher. And I’m wary of anything that might be seen as encouraging them. But again, there’s probably no way to actually enforce that in any kind of law.
captainkrtek 3y ago
Intentionally crashing a plane into a national park, in a state that deals with lots of wildfires, is incredibly reckless. Lucky no one got killed, or that a wildfire didn’t start.
- garrettgarcia 3y ago
  National Forest, not National Park
  - saganus 3y ago
    Genuine question, what is the difference? I've never heard the term National Forest before.
    - FanaHOVA 3y ago
      National Parks, managed by the National Park Service, are designated primarily for preservation and public enjoyment. You're there to observe and enjoy, but not to alter. Activities like logging, mining, and hunting are generally prohibited. On the other hand, National Forests, managed by the U.S. Forest Service, follow a multiple-use and sustained-yield approach. They're designed to support a variety of activities, including logging, grazing, mining, and recreation. These activities are carried out under sustainable practices to ensure the resources remain for future generations.
    - CPLX 3y ago
      A forest and a park have completely different uses. A national park is a place for humans, and to some extent, wildlife, to enjoy, A forest in this context is a natural resource to be exploited. For the most part it’s a place where lumber is harvested.
      - chihuahua 3y ago
        Not true. Lots of National Forest land has campgrounds, maintained trails, wildlife protection areas, etc. There is also lumber harvesting. It's for many different kinds of use.
waiwai933 3y ago
20 years is the maximum, not what he'll get. Skimming the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, I make it: * A base level of 14 for an obstruction of justice charge (§2J1.2) * -2 for acceptance of responsibility (§3E1.1) Assuming no previous criminal history, that's a guideline sentence of 10-16 months. If he can get it down one more point to a level 11 sentence, that's a Zone B sentence and can be entirely served on probation. The DoJ press release is at https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-man-who-deliberately-crashed-airplane-youtube-video-admits https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma..., but the plea agreement isn't available (yet), which would indicate if they've agreed on an offence level and any adjustments. EDIT: Found the plea agreement; see comment in thread
- tonetheman 3y ago
  [dead]
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > The DoJ press release is at https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma… https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma..., but the plea agreement isn’t available (yet), which would indicate if they’ve agreed on an offence level and any adjustments. Note, however, that even if an agreement was reached that such an agreement is an agreement on what to present to the court; the court may not be bound, in accepting the plea agreement, to accept, in sentencing, the recommended offense level, or the recommend adjustments, or even to stick to the guidelines, depending on the exact form of the agreement. [EDIT: Revised based on a correction in the response comment].
  - waiwai933 3y ago
    I believe - and to be honest the Sentencing Guidelines are just on the boundary of my wheelhouse, but plea agreements are well outside - that Rule 11(c)(1)(C) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure allow a plea agreement that binds the court, so depends on the nature of the exact plea agreement. (see also §6B1.2 of the Sentencing Guidelines)
tptacek 3y ago
"Could be sentenced to" or "faces" means literally nothing. https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  “Faces up to…” means exactly what it says, that is “Faces a sentence that cannot exceed…” Now, it doesn’t (in general) mean “Is likely to receive, if convicted”, which some people tend to assume, but it also doesn’t mean nothing. And given the fact that upward departure is allowed from the federal sentencing guidelines, but not from the statutory maximums for the offenses charged, it is literally all you can tell with certainty from the charges themselves.
  - akerl_ 3y ago
    "Faces a sentence that cannot exceed" and "faces up to" convey very different messages.
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      They literally mean the exact same thing.
      - akerl_ 3y ago
        That's great, and if humans were a silicon-based life form that parsed language dispassionately, I'm sure it would be relevant. But humans are made of meat, and words and phrases have connotations. There's a difference in the perception (both to the subject and society) between those two options. "Cannot exceed" makes it pretty clear that it's a maximum bound, and doesn't imply that the actual number will be any particular distance between zero and the maximum. "Up to" leads the reader to assume that the likely sentence is close to the stated amount.
        3y ago
pigbearpig 3y ago
This is a plea deal, no one is going to plea to the maximum, which in this case is 20 years. The punishment can also be a fine [1], which may be fitting if the goal was profit from a YouTube video. When news articles mention the maximum, especially in headlines, it feels a bit misleading. It seems there's a decent chance there is little or no prison. [1]https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519
- deleted 3y ago
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- glonq 3y ago
  TBF when internet news articles mention anything, it feels quite misleading :P
  - andreygrehov 3y ago
    "If you don’t read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed."
- ehsankia 3y ago
  But that's what "up to" means. Almost every indictment is reported as "up to X" with X being the maximum. But it's almost never the maximum.
  - 542458 3y ago
    I mean, it’s a bit like if I reported “Next-gen Tesla could reach speeds as high as 671 million miles per hour”. But in both cases the reality will fall so far short of the maximum that the maximum’s value is essentially irrelevant.
  - CobrastanJorji 3y ago
    Technically correct isn't actually the best kind of correct. "Local Man Shorts One Share of IBM, Faces Up To One Billion Dollars of Loss" is technically correct, in the sense that there's no real upper bound, but it's not useful, and it's actively misleading. A reasonable estimate based on sentencing guidelines isn't super hard for a lawyer to work out, and it'd be far more useful for readers, but it's slightly more work and it makes for significantly less exciting headlines.
duxup 3y ago
The strange thing about it was that the video was so odd. Dude was filming himself flying, the engine stops… and all of a sudden he decides to bail out. No effort to do anything, he just bails out. I don’t know why he thought his video would even seem realistic.
- ocdtrekkie 3y ago
  He's probably a shoddy actor and wouldn't be able to give anything approaching a believable performance of trying to save the plane.
  - duxup 3y ago
    Probably didn’t want to make a radio call that would raise more suspicions, or try land a fully functional the plane on a road… But then the result was even more unrealistic / suspicious.
    - tass 3y ago
      Here’s a couple of articles illustrating your point - crashing a fully functional plane happens, but his video made it pretty unbelievable https://generalaviationnews.com/2015/03/16/misplaced-fuel-selector-valve-brings-down-piper/ https://generalaviationnews.com/2015/03/16/misplaced-fuel-se... https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/systems/dont-cause-your-own-fuel-starvation-accident/ https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/systems/dont-cause-y...
    - matt-attack 3y ago
      He wouldn’t have had to actually make the radio call. No one on YouTube would’ve noticed if he didn’t push the PTT button and just started talking.
      - duxup 3y ago
        FAA would notice that no call actually went out ;)
- 3y ago
astura 3y ago
Really surprised the reupload of the video still up - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM The original version had some silly BS "I'm so brave for posting this video always wear a parachute (even though I don't in any other video)" text at the beginning and a ridge wallet sponsorship.
- userbinator 3y ago
  It's evidence.
diebeforei485 3y ago
I think this guy should spend a weekend behind bars. What he did was quite dangerous.
- bitcharmer 3y ago
  I hope you're joking because he should spend years behind bars, not a weekend
  - diebeforei485 3y ago
    No, I actually disagree with long sentences. I think somewhere between a weekend to a month is appropriate.
renewiltord 3y ago
Interesting, considering he could have saved up to 7 billion lives through this act and been a real hero.
- welcome_dragon 3y ago
  I feel like I'm missing some sort of inside joke ...
  - renewiltord 3y ago
    Just thought I'd add to the 'up to' jokes that were the predominant comment matter here.
rbosinger 3y ago
> Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. I once helped a friend do something like this with a bunch of garbage from a house party he threw at his parents place and wanted to cover up. We drove around dropping bits of the 10+ bags of trash in bins here and there. I'm in awe imagining doing this with a plane.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- tobych 3y ago
  First time in a decade I've ever laughed out loud at a HN comment. Gorgeously absurd. And I believe you. Thanks. I needed a laugh.
- blt 3y ago
  Maybe he wanted to familiarize himself with Lompoc in preparation for the inevitable. (There is a low-security federal prison in Lompoc.)
bmurray7jhu 3y ago
This search warrant has details not in the plea agreement. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.858744/gov.uscourts.cacd.858744.1.0.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.85...
- mvdtnz 3y ago
  Do you care to share what those details are, or shall we all just read the 38 page PDF?
  - bmurray7jhu 3y ago
    Jacob plead guilty after the government found Jacob's unilateral recording of himself making false statements during a phone call with an FAA investigator. The plea bargain mentions these false statements, but only the search warrant notes that Jacob made perhaps the only recording of himself committing a federal crime. The search warrant also includes a narrative into the investigation of four other crimes for which Jacob was investigated, but not ultimately charged.
    - olddustytrail 3y ago
      I can't believe Americans accept that it's a criminal offence to lie to federal officials. Why don't you push back against such a bizarre overreach?
      - jzb 3y ago
        "Why don't you push back against such a bizarre overreach?" Well, gee, I'm just gonna run right out and riot over it. Thanks for the suggestion. Is it not a criminal offense to lie to whatever the equivalent of the FAA is in your country if you're a pilot or otherwise under investigation for the equivalent crimes this YouTuber committed? The context is important here: If I understand correctly, the pilot had to have a license issued by the FAA and should've been made aware of laws and penalties in the context of operating a plane. Operating a plane is not a right, it's a privilege. It's also in the public interest that there are strict regulations and investigators with the ability to look into these types of crimes. The pilot ditched a plane and then tried to obstruct an investigation into the crime. He did commit several crimes and potentially endangered others. He tried to lie to cover it up. As a U.S. citizen who has a vested interest in not being hit by planes dropping out of the sky because the pilot decided to try to get more YouTube views - I'm not particularly offended that this is a crime. The FAA investigator's job is to assess the cause of air accidents. That may involve interviewing a lot of people with a lot of incentive to lie -- pilots, executives of plane manufacturers who may have cut corners leading to accidents, air traffic controllers, engineers trying to avoid blame, etc. Lots of scenarios where the incentive to lie is high, the impact of a cover-up may be bad for society overall, and without penalties people would lie with impunity. There should be guardrails around what they can ask. If he was convicted of lying about something totally unrelated to air safety, I might feel differently. This does not feel like an overreach to me.
ilyt 3y ago
Wow, so he did some utterly dumb thing then... doubled and tripled down on other dumb things.
avazhi 3y ago
Remember boys, don’t fuck with the FAA. I hope Mr Jacobs ends up serving several years (5-10 seems reasonable) to very strongly dissuade others from having similar ideas in the future. General aviation is already a relatively high risk activity without bringing reckless attention whoring influencers into the equation.
- turrican 3y ago
  The guy is truly a moron and deserves some jail time, but 10 years? For being an idiot influencer that didn’t harm anyone? Heck, if you rape someone in California, the max time in jail is less than that.
  - avazhi 3y ago
    The fact he didn't harm anyone (or anything other than his plane) is partly luck. Yes it's an uninhabited area, but there are hikers, campers, wildlife, etc. It's a public area. It was incredibly reckless. As for your comment about sentencing in California, that possibly says less about what the punishment for recklessly endangering lives and property should be than it does about criminal sentencing in California, in my opinion. One might also suggest that putting completely innocent lives at risk over YouTube clicks is something that would be absolutely harmful if enough people engaged in that sort of behaviour, and to that extent I think that a sentence that corresponds to what one would receive for certain kinds of sexual assault is not inappropriate.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- tobych 3y ago
  And girls.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
gnicholas 3y ago
> Jacob admitted he...had created the video to make money through a sponsorship with a wallet company. How much money would the sponsor have paid, and would it have been worth more than the cost of the crashed plane? I have no idea what planes cost, or how much sponsors pay, but this struck me as unlikely to be profitable (even before the costs of his criminal prosecution).
- koromak 3y ago
  I think sponsors pay surprisingly well, like 10k for that video wouldn't be unreasonable, and it could be way more. The plane he crashed was a real beater, not worth much at all.
- astura 3y ago
  The search warrant (posted elsewhere on this thread) answers this question. He bought the plane specifically for this stunt a few weeks before, he did not use his normal plane. He paid $5,000 for the plane and $5,000 for the helicopter recovery of the wreckage. He received $8,000 from the Ridge Wallet sponsorship. Here's the relevant quotes- >Inspector Krantz provided me a receipt he obtained from the company Ridge Wallet. The receipt showed an $8,000 payment to JACOB for the sponsored ad shown on JACOB’s YouTube video. > An FAA Aircraft Bill of Sale for N29508, Taylorcraft BL65, serial number 2351 showed that, effective October 06, 2021, Laura Smith (seller) transferred ownership of the aircraft to JACOB (purchaser). The sale price listed on the form was $5,000. > On January 05, 2022, Sinton provided Krantz a written statement via e-mail. I reviewed the statement and learned the following: (1) JACOB called SINTON a few days before December 10, 2021, to lift his wrecked Taylorcraft airplane out of the forest; (2) JACOB said he was cleared to salvage the plane; (3) On December 10, 2021, Sinton flew his helicopter and met JACOB and a friend at Rancho Siquoc (Santa Maria, California); (4) Sinton flew JACOB and his friend to the wreckage and dropped them off with straps and shackles; (5) Sinton landed in an open field nearby, put on the helicopter long line and returned to the wreckage site; (6) Sinton hooked onto the plane and flew it to JACOB’s trailer; (7) Sinton sent JACOB an invoice for $4,950; and (8) On December 31, 2021, JACOB’s friend “Steve Dozier” paid Sinton $5,000 on behalf of JACOB.
neom 3y ago
I was a little obsessed with this when it happened, here are some good analysis videos if you're interested in Rabbitholing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dghy-yyUMHo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dghy-yyUMHo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YD6m-gVKoYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YD6m-gVKoYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEsXJB8IOzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEsXJB8IOzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EZ3Uom7tFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EZ3Uom7tFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYE7-XSSz0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYE7-XSSz0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PgGvl2ZMFs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PgGvl2ZMFs
- koromak 3y ago
  That was a fun week
testfoobar 3y ago
Not a pilot. Could he have landed that plane safely in the valley below him from that altitude with a dead engine?
- akiselev 3y ago
  Yes. There was a nearby dry river bed clearly visible in the video. It's a moot point though because it was a deliberate stunt.
- mfkp 3y ago
  Yes, multiple people on YouTube recreated the scenario in a flight simulator and found that it could have been landed safely.
ineedasername 3y ago
Seems like yet another game of: Play stupid games; Win stupid prizes ~ Just… stupid
ftxbro 3y ago
I remember being taught about "yellow journalism" in the 1890s history chapter in school. Maybe in the future they will have some name for the kind of influencer culture or sponsored deceptive clickbait youtubing illustrated in this article and they will teach about it in some history chapter in schools.
- proxiful-wash 3y ago
  What is the reason this is called yellow journalism?
  - ftxbro 3y ago
    It's not yellow journalism.
  - thaumasiotes 3y ago
    Yellow journalism is named after a frequent theme in the journalism of the time, the yellow peril.
    - bigbillheck 3y ago
      It was the Yellow Kid, actually: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism#Etymology_and_early_usage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism#Etymology_an...
gavinhoward 3y ago
This case infuriates me. At the time, I had just finished sending in an appeal to being denied a medical clearance to become a pilot because of a history of clinical depression. That appeal required undergoing a battery of tests, a psychological evaluation, multiple meetings with a therapist and a report from the same, and 15 hours of flight instruction plus a report of my performance by the flight instructors. I intended to be professional. Everyone thought I was safe to fly. I nevertheless thought the FAA would deny my appeal. I was right. [1] So because I once had clinical depression, I can't get a medical. And yet, yahoos like this get to fly simply because stupidity and malice isn't as well-documented as a history of mental illness. Sigh... To be clear, I don't think the FAA is at fault here; they didn't know, and they acted fast once he did it. They did a great job. I just wish they would let me fly. [1]: https://gavinhoward.com/2022/09/grounded-for-life-losing-the-dream-of-flight/ https://gavinhoward.com/2022/09/grounded-for-life-losing-the...
- latchkey 3y ago
  Is flying in the US your only option?
  - gavinhoward 3y ago
    Now that I have a history with the FAA, I probably couldn't fly international. I also have a wife. I can't just pack up and move to a different country. When the rejection came, I decided my marriage was worth more than flying.
    - latchkey 3y ago
      Yea, I read your post. Having now lived outside of the US for a period of time, I've come to the grand realization that the US is one of the least 'free' countries out there (and I moved to a communist country!). My guess is that if you really wanted to find a way to fly, you could, and it wouldn't require moving. If there is a will, there is a way.
      - gavinhoward 3y ago
throwaway5752 3y ago
What a trash person. Cutting up the plane and distributing the wreckage. They clearly knew it was a crime. I hope they get the upper bounds of the sentencing guidelines.
wodenokoto 3y ago
I’m not trying to insinuate that coming clean would have absolved him, but I do wonder what it would have looked like if he admitted to investigators that he crashed the plane on purpose.
M3L0NM4N 3y ago
Anyone following this from the beginning knew it was fake. Glad he tacked on another charge by pleading guilty to obstruction of the investigation.
- epolanski 3y ago
  It was beyond obvious: the idea of trying to glide and land to a safe place didn't even scratch his mind which is the standard procedure, and all he did as soon as the engine stopped was to go in parachute mode.
  - jnsaff2 3y ago
    yea, amateur hour youtube production too not only disgraceful behavior of a pilot and a human, one could have gotten so much more drama out of actually "trying everything" before "accidentally" finding a parachute in the plane and getting out "at the last moment"
everyone 3y ago
Nice! What an idiot.
sundarurfriend 3y ago
> Trevor Jacob (born August 6, 1993) is an American snowboard cross competitor, extreme sports athlete, YouTuber, and former aircraft pilot. For anyone else wondering if it's a YouTuber they know. It seems more like they're an athlete that dabbles in YouTube and got famous for this one video.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
curiousgal 3y ago
The only shocking thing about the story is him being 29 years old
grecy 3y ago
FWIW, the video of the "crash" has 3 million views, which earned him roughly $30,000 from YouTube direct revenue alone.
- jraph 3y ago
  How does this compare with the cost the crashed plane?
- TMWNN 3y ago
  How linear is the scale? I presume that 300,000 views for a video does not give the video's uploader $3,000. (Or does it?) Conversely, would 3 million views = $300,000, or more than that?
  - grecy 3y ago
    It's a good approximation to say 1,000 views = $10.
shapefrog 3y ago
Please enter a plead - Not guilty by reason of its a prank bro.
tibbydudeza 3y ago
Well it worked out better than somebody who tried to repeat the telephone book stunt in the Sopranos (Phil Leotardo shoots somebody through a telephone book at close range to make his point about next time) Youtuber forgot it was a tv stunt.
koito17 3y ago
I remember first seeing the video of the guy crashing his plane. It's one of the rare times I opened up yt-dlp just to download the video and archive it, because I was expecting him to take down the video after sufficiently many people caught on to the act. While a maximum of 20 years prison sounds rather harsh, intentionally crashing a plane is no joke or laughing matter. It's unfortunate that things had to end this way. The FAA does not mess around.
- sschueller 3y ago
  Isn't the punishment not for deliberately crashing but for destroying evidence involving a federal investigation?
  - s_dev 3y ago
    The fact that it wasn't a controlled crash it's what's most alarming -- a plane crash could be achieved legally using qualified stunt professionals etc -- he just parachuted out of a plane leaving the plane to it's own devices. While unlikely it's possible that plane could have crashed in to a person killing them.
    - _0ffh 3y ago
      Absolutely! "Irresponsible" doesn't even begin to cover behaviour like that!
    - belter 3y ago
      34°48'53.6"N 119°57'40.4"W was where the airplane hit the ground. If you have a look at Google maps, within a 3 to 4 mile radius, there are multiple kids camping grounds. Even assuming they are only sporadically occupied this is a new level of recklessness.
      - Verdex 3y ago
        I just checked it out on maps.google. Multiple camping grounds here means something like ~15-20 spread out in all directions in addition to some hiking trails. [I watched the video (iirc) about a week after all this originally went down. Watching an airplane just kind of cruise around on its own was pretty horrifying. But I did feel a little bit better that afterwards he had to hike around seemingly forever to find someone to give him a ride. Like, at least things were remote, and he's lucky that he didn't die trying to get back to civilization. However, apparently he thought about this as well, because nope, there's stuff all around that area. This is shooting a gun into the air to see if the bullet will come down and hurt you, but instead of doing it in a dry lake bed you do it right next to a children's hospital so you have someplace to go in case you do get hurt. The other side of hanlon's razor is "sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable from malice".]
jwilk 3y ago
https://archive.today/nhSVy https://archive.today/nhSVy
FreeCodeFreak 3y ago
20 years is outrageous and very unlikely given his probable experience and making sure no one would be hurt. There is a vast difference in crashing an airplane over a populated area, intentionally wanting to cause harm, and it being accident. Afaik this area is not even populated. If such a thing happened by accident, you should not get 20 years. If you did so intentionally wanting to cause harm, them perhaps you should get 20+ years, because that would be an act of terrorism. If someone got killed, you should probably not get your freedom back. Journalists need to always mind the context and emphasize the likelihood of what will be the outcome. It is not really truthful to bluntly state he faces 20 years. If he were to actually get 20, the legal system would obviously be severely flawed. There are murderers that get 20 ffs.
- rat9988 3y ago
  He has agreed to plead guilty to one count of destruction and concealment with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation, a crime that carries a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison. I find the context very clear. The writer did a superb job.
- xd 3y ago
  Someone crashing a plane on purpose doesn't amount to terrorism - there would need to be a political motivation as well. Edit: Also the post says up to 20 years .. not sure why you've become fixated on it being simply 20. People dropping planes out of the sky for likes need to be made an example of imo, and I personally would be happy to see him locked up for life as a deterrent to others. The lengths people are going to for likes is frightening.
  - jona-f 3y ago
    I just hope you have absolutely no power in this world. You shouldnt have with your total lack of empathy and common sense. Locking an annoying guy away for life for a stupid prank... Nobody got hurt. And you're not even alone and don't even get downvoted like crazy. American society sure is fucked up.
    - 3y ago
d--b 3y ago
The one question no one seems to ask is: are youtube views really worth a plane? Did this guy also try to defraud his insurance?
- jnsaff2 3y ago
  There was a sponsorship deal with a wallet company involved. Airworthy planes seem to start from around $20k so it may even work out. Tho the intelligence of the guy doing it seems not to be brightest so I would not rule out it being a lose-lose situation out of stupidity.
- sharkbird2 3y ago
  I think they could be, if they lead to subscriptions and long-term success for his channel. Not saying it was in any way ethically justifiable, just that from a purely machiavellian perspective I think it could make sense.
bambax 3y ago
> Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. Marvelous! Like an ordinary criminal trying to dispose of the body. He may have thought no body, no crime? but that doesn't work very well when said crime is filmed start to finish and published on Youtube...
- b112 3y ago
  He may have thought no body, no crime? He may have, or maybe he thought he did nothing wrong, which is why he had it on youtube. And so he disposed of the plane wreckage, as he needed to, lest he be fined, and he cut it up so it would fit in the bins.
  - bambax 3y ago
    He was a licensed pilot. It's unlikely he thought he hadn't done anything wrong. He also repeatedly told the FAA and the NTSB he didn't know where the plane was -- whilst he was in fact cutting it up in his garage...
    - jaystraw 3y ago
      imo, he knew what he was doing was illegal, but didn't think it was wrong.
- madeofpalk 3y ago
  ...or if you call the 'Police' before and tell them you crashed!
- lt_kernelpanic 3y ago
  Airbeas Corpus
- ithkuil 3y ago
  "The video was just a deep fake, your honour"
- caskstrength 3y ago
jacquesm 3y ago
There were two of these, one guy crashing his plane over land (this guy) and another iirc that did the same thing over the sea. Anybody know what happened with that second guy?
- cogogo 3y ago
  The other one was suspicious but not so much evidence it was a stunt. https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/on-video-guy-ditches-plane-in-pacific-suspicions-run-rampant/ https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/on-video-guy-ditche...
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    That one definitely endangered someone else as well.
nraynaud 3y ago
A bit of context is that the FAA doesn't want plane crashes at all (unless you're NASA), even "safe ones" because of the public image, so it's extremely difficult to get a waiver for a stunt if there is a real risk of crashing an airplane, even if it's empty and as safe as possible, it's not about safety, it's about public image. People afraid of flying are a very difficult crowd to manage.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Dah00n 3y ago
  Huh, managing people sounds very ominous.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- SirMaster 3y ago
  Surely they crash real planes in movies from time-to-time no? Or is it really always all CGI?
  - capableweb 3y ago
    Yes, there are real planes sometimes used in movie stunts for doing crashes, it's not all CGI, although most is, doing real things like that costs a lot of money. But regardless, if "not scaring fly-scared people" was actually a concern, any planes crashing in movies would be forbidden, not just real planes crashing in movies. But it's not.
    - piker 3y ago
      Not likely given the broad sweep of the First Amendment. Much easier for the FAA to deny a license to crash a plane under various safety rationales than to say "you can't show that because of the message" in the United States. The latter is almost certainly unconstitutional.
  - 3y ago
Namari 3y ago
Taken from youtube comments: > For anyone wondering why the FAA yanked his license. 1) attached multiple cameras to the craft (not illegal but suspect) 2) Wearing a sports parachute (there uncomfortable as hell and he never wore any chute on any other flight) 3) opened the side door before claiming any engine failure. 4) made no attempt to restart engine 5) made no attempt to find a safe landing spot even though there were multiple landing areas in easy gliding distance 6) jumped out of the plan with a selfie stick which is not normal behaviour during a crisis . 7) Made his way to the wreck and took all the cameras 8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities . 9) made no attempt to communicate on emergency frequency None of which deals with the fact he had fire extinguishers strapped to his legs since that not technically illegal or the deliberate crashing of his plane into national reserve.
- capableweb 3y ago
  > 8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities . Not just disposed, but disposed in multiple locations: > two weeks after the drama he and a friend winched the wreckage out of the forest with a helicopter, [...] Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. [...] In a plea agreement, Jacob admitted he had intended to obstruct federal authorities when he disposed of the wreckage
  - hef19898 3y ago
    I get, from his point of view, that he removed the cameras. But the plane wreckage? How stupid can people be...
  - plorg 3y ago
    >8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities Worse, he reported the incident to the FAA, who asked him for the location and told him not to disturb the wreck (they told him more than once). He then disposed of the plane and continued telling the FAA/NTSB he didn't know where it was.
- belter 3y ago
acd 3y ago
Youtube acts as social media. Its an attention economy. I think there is something wrong with advertisement combined with social media. What I think is wrong is that as long as there are viewers algoritms promotes content which get a lot of viewers.
mcfedr 3y ago
What is the sponsor getting? They presumably knew what they were paying for, a hefty fine in their direction seems very appropriate
omega3 3y ago
They should follow the money and look into the sponsor as well.
pm3003 3y ago
He's a top contender for the Internet's most hated person....
fatneckbeard 3y ago
It's funny how if you are a major corporation with fat government contracts you can systematically destroy your engineering department, ostracize whistleblowers, and wind up killing hundreds of people and nobody gets punished and the FAA will even be on your side, like the Boeing thing. but if you make a youtube stunt that hurts nobody you can get 20 years in prison and the FAA acts like you besmirched the stellar reputation of the aviation industry.
- jjallen 3y ago
  Both should suffer serious consequences IMO. Boeing more so.
  - akudha 3y ago
    Yes, but 20 years for this dude is a bit excessive, no? Especially when nobody was killed or injured?
    - wartijn_ 3y ago
      The 20 years is not for crashing his plane, but for "one count of destruction and concealment with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation"
      - jstanley 3y ago
        [flagged]
        eppp 3y ago
        We all are. Pests like this are a drain on our entire government and society. How many hours have been wasted on this stupid stunt that was entirely his doing for no reason at all. He then tried to cover it up and lied about it. He wasted our time this morning reading about it again because he is a selfish liar.
        3y ago
3327 3y ago
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ectospheno 3y ago
Thought exercise: List all crimes for which five years in prison would be a deterrent for you but one year in prison would not. My list is zero entries. Perhaps sentencing guidelines are just us spanking people and not actually a deterrent. Please post your list when responding.
- mongol 3y ago
  I mean, most people are not interested in doing crimes, no matter the sentence. Do you expect someone to say, "cool, only one year for burglary, what a steal!"
  - ectospheno 3y ago
    Yes... that is the point...
atum47 3y ago
I think the 20 years is more to make an example out of him. In those days where people eat soap, put themselves in danger, harass police officers and even crash planes to get views / attention, this kind of sentence will put fear in people, I think.
can16358p 3y ago
It was a terrible and a stupid, not-well-though stunt. Absolutely terrible. Though, what damage other than crashed debris in a remote land, is exactly done? Not to support the act anyway, but as long as no one got hurt, one may not face 20 years jail time for crashing their own plane in a remote land. Stupid? Absolutely. Illegal? Shouldn't be.
- shadowgovt 3y ago
  He's not facing 20 years of jail time for crashing the plane. That would have been revocation of his license and possibly some time for reckless endangerment. He's facing 20 years of jail time for wanton destruction of evidence and impeding a federal investigation. The FAA doesn't have the resources to launch a deep detective dive on every crash, and the penalties are set to highly discourage the practice of impeding understanding of what happened in a crash because that's part of the process of making the air safer for everyone (ground-side as well as air-side). Even the wreck itself, in its undisturbed state, would have been valuable for better understanding of how an uncontrolled plane meets its end (including possible opportunities to improve the safety of the inevitable disassembly when it finds the ground). ... unless some likes-hound cuts the plane up into tiny pieces and tries to hide it.
- hermannj314 3y ago
  Your desire is that reckless disregard for human life, tampering with evidence and lying on official government documents aren't crimes unless a person is physically hurt? Got it, most people in our democracy disagree with you, but feel free to vote in the next election.
  - kurisufag 3y ago
    your comment is unhelpful and unnecessarily aggressive. a better way to express the same sentiment would be pointing out the reasons that evidence tampering, despite not having an immediate victim, can be harmful.
    - hermannj314 3y ago
PaulHoule 3y ago
See https://abcnews.go.com/2020/marcus-schrenker-fake-death/story?id=10201960 https://abcnews.go.com/2020/marcus-schrenker-fake-death/stor...
solotronics 3y ago
Is it actually even illegal to crash a plane on purpose? Plane companies do this all the time for testing purposes, albeit in a controlled manner.
93po 3y ago
Another story of why you should never talk to the police (or investigators of any kind). This kid would have been fine if he didn't fucking say anything to them.
mdwalters 3y ago
youtubers nowadays would do anything for a sponsorship

460 points by tafda 3y ago

Just a small question. Why does crashing a plane cause such a huge discussion and such an impressive sentence? unless someone causes damage to any public or private property while crashing the plane it's a harmless thing to do. Who is it hurting and why is the YouTuber punished?Curious.

skobovm 3y ago
There are probably many reasons for this, but here’s my take: the GA community is largely self-policing. There are dozens of regs one could break — whether it’s 8 hours bottle to throttle or busting VFR cloud mins — however the pilot community adheres to them almost religiously. To have someone so blatantly and publicly violate regs with a complete disregard for safety and property would be setting a terrible precedent for the FAA. Additionally, this is in the best interests of the GA community as a whole, given that it always has been and will continue to be under scrutiny from the general public. No one wants there to be the perception that among them there is a 100LL cowboy who’s gonna bust through a bravo, slam a red bull, and ditch their plane over a neighborhood. The hammer needs to come down, and it needs to come down hard.

dmitrygr 3y ago

Curiously, the charge he pled guilty to as part of the plea deal has nothing to do with planes. He pled guilty to obstructing a federal investigation (of the crash). Makes sense. Proving his intent w.r.t. the crash back then would be harder than proving that he DID remove the wreck and subsequently destroyed it.

mc32 3y ago
I dunno. I believe the guy is guilty and should be punished for recklessness, etc. but I don’t like it when authorities rely on indirect charges to “get” someone. Prove the original crime, don’t rely and peripheral procedure like “they lied to a federal agent” (uhh) cop-out. Do your job. Likewise I’m not don’t of people getting off on “technicalities” (Some more than others)
- dfadsadsf 3y ago
  Fully agree. After how obstruction of justice without underlying crime was used in political trials recently, I would fully support either removing or substantially increasing bar for it to be a crime.
  - mempko 3y ago
    I'm not aware of any political trials. Which trials are you referring to?
- sgjohnson 3y ago
  > Prove the original crime The evidence of which was destroyed?
  - rain1 3y ago
    "I Crashed My Airplane" - TrevorJacob https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM
    - sgjohnson 3y ago
      Yes, obviously the FAA/NTSB/whatever agency needed the remains of that plane to prove their case that the crash landing was staged. I don't think that the video alone gets past the reasonable doubt standard.
      - mc32 3y ago
        What’s the angle? The fuselage doesn’t crumple one way if it’s staged and another way if it was an accident. The metal and construction materials cannot know intent.
        sgjohnson 3y ago
        It should still be possible to find out if there was a problem with the engine before the crash.

zerohp 3y ago

Good. Make an example out of him.

deleted 3y ago
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dang 3y ago
Ok, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to HN. We want curious conversation here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
keyme 3y ago
Why? In all, the original crime is equivalent to dumping a big piece of trash in the forest. Faking stuff for youtube is not a crime. Obstructing an unnecessary investigation is a big deal only because people fear-mongered us to believe it's a big deal. Guy should get a good slap and a 6 figure fine. Not get his life taken away.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Alupis 3y ago
  > Why? In all, the original crime is equivalent to dumping a big piece of trash in the forest It's a bit more serious than that. It worked out to not harm anyone or do large-scale damages (fire, destruction, etc) this time, but it was still wildly dangerous and demonstrated a complete lack and disregard for aviation safety and rules. A more apt comparison would be throwing a table off the Empire State Building, and it just so happened to not hit anything below.
  - PinkRidingHood 3y ago
    I'm reading about the "extensive planning enhancement" here on comments and I'm wondering why that would've got him more prison time... If he picked a time where there was no one and a spot to crash the plane where it wouldn't have started a fire (he probably didn't want to kill anyone), wouldn't it have been a less harmful act? I'm just saying, the "potential to cause harm" is vague here, it could be equivalent to throwing down a table off the Empire State Building according to careful physics calculations and precisely avoid killing anybody. It's still harmful (because the calculations can be incorrect), but less so. (honestly had he not destroyed the evidence and made the plea that he constructed the crash in a way that was designed not to harm anyone, and it ended up not harming anyone, I suspect he might've gotten a lower sentence)

thrill 3y ago

Harsh, but fair.

valine 3y ago
Feels overly harsh considering no one was hurt. Send him to jail for a year for obstructing the investigation. It’s not like he’s going to do this again.
- silisili 3y ago
  But they could have been hurt, especially if he kicked off a wildfire or landed on some unsuspecting party. I mean, we charge people for hiring a hitman, or shooting at someone and missing, even though in both cases nobody is necessarily harmed. 20 years may be excessive, but I'm not sure 'was anyone actually hurt' is a good sentencing guideline either.
  - ALittleLight 3y ago
    In those cases the intent would be to cause harm. Here the intent was not to cause harm, it was just a reckless and bad thing to do.
    - silisili 3y ago
      That's a very fair point. I guess the question then is how we should treat recklessness with potential to harm, as there definitely should be a deterrent for that. But perhaps not as much as my examples.
      - Alupis 3y ago
        We treat drunk drivers harshly, even if they harmed no one. The potential for harm, body and property, combined with the complete disregard for safety (aviation and otherwise) and federal aviation laws/regulations, from someone who had a high level of training (as required for all private pilots) makes it really hard to excuse.

hammyhavoc 3y ago

People do some bizarre stuff in the name of clickbait.

404mm 3y ago
Sweet, sweet juicy internet points!!
- mabbo 3y ago
  And also the sponsorship he had with some wallet company.
  - MBCook 3y ago
    It’s too bad something can’t be done to them. They probably didn’t know. And if they did it would probably be incredibly hard to prove. Just doesn’t seem like anyone involved in any way should walk away without at least some punishment.
    - hammyhavoc 3y ago
      Well, if you sponsor a YouTuber to do a brand placement and he goes and does something drastic that wasn't in the contract, should you be punished? You're the victim too, he brought negative press to your doorstep brand-wise.
      - MBCook 3y ago
        I think there’s no way to practically do what I want. I don’t think it would work out. I just sort of feel like there should be some sort of incentive to help ensure this kind of stuff doesn’t happen. If you have a contract that explicitly says what the person is supposed to do and they don’t, then it seems like you have a good defense to me. On the other hand if you have a contract that says something along the lines of “do something that gets 1 million views and will pay you $200,000” then I feel like you should be liable. I really dislike the current trend of people just doing extreme stuff to try to get views. A few people have been killed, it’s kind of amazing the number isn’t higher. And I’m wary of anything that might be seen as encouraging them. But again, there’s probably no way to actually enforce that in any kind of law.

captainkrtek 3y ago

Intentionally crashing a plane into a national park, in a state that deals with lots of wildfires, is incredibly reckless. Lucky no one got killed, or that a wildfire didn’t start.

garrettgarcia 3y ago
National Forest, not National Park
- saganus 3y ago
  Genuine question, what is the difference? I've never heard the term National Forest before.
  - FanaHOVA 3y ago
    National Parks, managed by the National Park Service, are designated primarily for preservation and public enjoyment. You're there to observe and enjoy, but not to alter. Activities like logging, mining, and hunting are generally prohibited. On the other hand, National Forests, managed by the U.S. Forest Service, follow a multiple-use and sustained-yield approach. They're designed to support a variety of activities, including logging, grazing, mining, and recreation. These activities are carried out under sustainable practices to ensure the resources remain for future generations.
  - CPLX 3y ago
    A forest and a park have completely different uses. A national park is a place for humans, and to some extent, wildlife, to enjoy, A forest in this context is a natural resource to be exploited. For the most part it’s a place where lumber is harvested.
    - chihuahua 3y ago
      Not true. Lots of National Forest land has campgrounds, maintained trails, wildlife protection areas, etc. There is also lumber harvesting. It's for many different kinds of use.

waiwai933 3y ago

20 years is the maximum, not what he'll get. Skimming the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, I make it: * A base level of 14 for an obstruction of justice charge (§2J1.2) * -2 for acceptance of responsibility (§3E1.1) Assuming no previous criminal history, that's a guideline sentence of 10-16 months. If he can get it down one more point to a level 11 sentence, that's a Zone B sentence and can be entirely served on probation. The DoJ press release is at https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-man-who-deliberately-crashed-airplane-youtube-video-admits https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma..., but the plea agreement isn't available (yet), which would indicate if they've agreed on an offence level and any adjustments. EDIT: Found the plea agreement; see comment in thread

tonetheman 3y ago
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dragonwriter 3y ago
> The DoJ press release is at https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma… https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/santa-barbara-county-ma..., but the plea agreement isn’t available (yet), which would indicate if they’ve agreed on an offence level and any adjustments. Note, however, that even if an agreement was reached that such an agreement is an agreement on what to present to the court; the court may not be bound, in accepting the plea agreement, to accept, in sentencing, the recommended offense level, or the recommend adjustments, or even to stick to the guidelines, depending on the exact form of the agreement. [EDIT: Revised based on a correction in the response comment].
- waiwai933 3y ago
  I believe - and to be honest the Sentencing Guidelines are just on the boundary of my wheelhouse, but plea agreements are well outside - that Rule 11(c)(1)(C) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure allow a plea agreement that binds the court, so depends on the nature of the exact plea agreement. (see also §6B1.2 of the Sentencing Guidelines)

tptacek 3y ago

"Could be sentenced to" or "faces" means literally nothing. https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...

dragonwriter 3y ago
“Faces up to…” means exactly what it says, that is “Faces a sentence that cannot exceed…” Now, it doesn’t (in general) mean “Is likely to receive, if convicted”, which some people tend to assume, but it also doesn’t mean nothing. And given the fact that upward departure is allowed from the federal sentencing guidelines, but not from the statutory maximums for the offenses charged, it is literally all you can tell with certainty from the charges themselves.
- akerl_ 3y ago
  "Faces a sentence that cannot exceed" and "faces up to" convey very different messages.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    They literally mean the exact same thing.
    - akerl_ 3y ago
      That's great, and if humans were a silicon-based life form that parsed language dispassionately, I'm sure it would be relevant. But humans are made of meat, and words and phrases have connotations. There's a difference in the perception (both to the subject and society) between those two options. "Cannot exceed" makes it pretty clear that it's a maximum bound, and doesn't imply that the actual number will be any particular distance between zero and the maximum. "Up to" leads the reader to assume that the likely sentence is close to the stated amount.
      - 3y ago

pigbearpig 3y ago

This is a plea deal, no one is going to plea to the maximum, which in this case is 20 years. The punishment can also be a fine [1], which may be fitting if the goal was profit from a YouTube video. When news articles mention the maximum, especially in headlines, it feels a bit misleading. It seems there's a decent chance there is little or no prison. [1]https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1519

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
glonq 3y ago
TBF when internet news articles mention anything, it feels quite misleading :P
- andreygrehov 3y ago
  "If you don’t read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed."
ehsankia 3y ago
But that's what "up to" means. Almost every indictment is reported as "up to X" with X being the maximum. But it's almost never the maximum.
- 542458 3y ago
  I mean, it’s a bit like if I reported “Next-gen Tesla could reach speeds as high as 671 million miles per hour”. But in both cases the reality will fall so far short of the maximum that the maximum’s value is essentially irrelevant.
- CobrastanJorji 3y ago
  Technically correct isn't actually the best kind of correct. "Local Man Shorts One Share of IBM, Faces Up To One Billion Dollars of Loss" is technically correct, in the sense that there's no real upper bound, but it's not useful, and it's actively misleading. A reasonable estimate based on sentencing guidelines isn't super hard for a lawyer to work out, and it'd be far more useful for readers, but it's slightly more work and it makes for significantly less exciting headlines.

duxup 3y ago

The strange thing about it was that the video was so odd. Dude was filming himself flying, the engine stops… and all of a sudden he decides to bail out. No effort to do anything, he just bails out. I don’t know why he thought his video would even seem realistic.

ocdtrekkie 3y ago
He's probably a shoddy actor and wouldn't be able to give anything approaching a believable performance of trying to save the plane.
- duxup 3y ago
  Probably didn’t want to make a radio call that would raise more suspicions, or try land a fully functional the plane on a road… But then the result was even more unrealistic / suspicious.
  - tass 3y ago
    Here’s a couple of articles illustrating your point - crashing a fully functional plane happens, but his video made it pretty unbelievable https://generalaviationnews.com/2015/03/16/misplaced-fuel-selector-valve-brings-down-piper/ https://generalaviationnews.com/2015/03/16/misplaced-fuel-se... https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/systems/dont-cause-your-own-fuel-starvation-accident/ https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/systems/dont-cause-y...
  - matt-attack 3y ago
    He wouldn’t have had to actually make the radio call. No one on YouTube would’ve noticed if he didn’t push the PTT button and just started talking.
    - duxup 3y ago
      FAA would notice that no call actually went out ;)
3y ago

astura 3y ago

Really surprised the reupload of the video still up - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vbYszLNZxhM The original version had some silly BS "I'm so brave for posting this video always wear a parachute (even though I don't in any other video)" text at the beginning and a ridge wallet sponsorship.

userbinator 3y ago
It's evidence.

diebeforei485 3y ago

I think this guy should spend a weekend behind bars. What he did was quite dangerous.

bitcharmer 3y ago
I hope you're joking because he should spend years behind bars, not a weekend
- diebeforei485 3y ago
  No, I actually disagree with long sentences. I think somewhere between a weekend to a month is appropriate.

renewiltord 3y ago

Interesting, considering he could have saved up to 7 billion lives through this act and been a real hero.

welcome_dragon 3y ago
I feel like I'm missing some sort of inside joke ...
- renewiltord 3y ago
  Just thought I'd add to the 'up to' jokes that were the predominant comment matter here.

rbosinger 3y ago

> Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. I once helped a friend do something like this with a bunch of garbage from a house party he threw at his parents place and wanted to cover up. We drove around dropping bits of the 10+ bags of trash in bins here and there. I'm in awe imagining doing this with a plane.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
tobych 3y ago
First time in a decade I've ever laughed out loud at a HN comment. Gorgeously absurd. And I believe you. Thanks. I needed a laugh.
blt 3y ago
Maybe he wanted to familiarize himself with Lompoc in preparation for the inevitable. (There is a low-security federal prison in Lompoc.)

bmurray7jhu 3y ago

This search warrant has details not in the plea agreement. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.858744/gov.uscourts.cacd.858744.1.0.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.85...

mvdtnz 3y ago
Do you care to share what those details are, or shall we all just read the 38 page PDF?
- bmurray7jhu 3y ago
  Jacob plead guilty after the government found Jacob's unilateral recording of himself making false statements during a phone call with an FAA investigator. The plea bargain mentions these false statements, but only the search warrant notes that Jacob made perhaps the only recording of himself committing a federal crime. The search warrant also includes a narrative into the investigation of four other crimes for which Jacob was investigated, but not ultimately charged.
  - olddustytrail 3y ago
    I can't believe Americans accept that it's a criminal offence to lie to federal officials. Why don't you push back against such a bizarre overreach?
    - jzb 3y ago
      "Why don't you push back against such a bizarre overreach?" Well, gee, I'm just gonna run right out and riot over it. Thanks for the suggestion. Is it not a criminal offense to lie to whatever the equivalent of the FAA is in your country if you're a pilot or otherwise under investigation for the equivalent crimes this YouTuber committed? The context is important here: If I understand correctly, the pilot had to have a license issued by the FAA and should've been made aware of laws and penalties in the context of operating a plane. Operating a plane is not a right, it's a privilege. It's also in the public interest that there are strict regulations and investigators with the ability to look into these types of crimes. The pilot ditched a plane and then tried to obstruct an investigation into the crime. He did commit several crimes and potentially endangered others. He tried to lie to cover it up. As a U.S. citizen who has a vested interest in not being hit by planes dropping out of the sky because the pilot decided to try to get more YouTube views - I'm not particularly offended that this is a crime. The FAA investigator's job is to assess the cause of air accidents. That may involve interviewing a lot of people with a lot of incentive to lie -- pilots, executives of plane manufacturers who may have cut corners leading to accidents, air traffic controllers, engineers trying to avoid blame, etc. Lots of scenarios where the incentive to lie is high, the impact of a cover-up may be bad for society overall, and without penalties people would lie with impunity. There should be guardrails around what they can ask. If he was convicted of lying about something totally unrelated to air safety, I might feel differently. This does not feel like an overreach to me.

ilyt 3y ago

Wow, so he did some utterly dumb thing then... doubled and tripled down on other dumb things.

avazhi 3y ago

Remember boys, don’t fuck with the FAA. I hope Mr Jacobs ends up serving several years (5-10 seems reasonable) to very strongly dissuade others from having similar ideas in the future. General aviation is already a relatively high risk activity without bringing reckless attention whoring influencers into the equation.

turrican 3y ago
The guy is truly a moron and deserves some jail time, but 10 years? For being an idiot influencer that didn’t harm anyone? Heck, if you rape someone in California, the max time in jail is less than that.
- avazhi 3y ago
  The fact he didn't harm anyone (or anything other than his plane) is partly luck. Yes it's an uninhabited area, but there are hikers, campers, wildlife, etc. It's a public area. It was incredibly reckless. As for your comment about sentencing in California, that possibly says less about what the punishment for recklessly endangering lives and property should be than it does about criminal sentencing in California, in my opinion. One might also suggest that putting completely innocent lives at risk over YouTube clicks is something that would be absolutely harmful if enough people engaged in that sort of behaviour, and to that extent I think that a sentence that corresponds to what one would receive for certain kinds of sexual assault is not inappropriate.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
tobych 3y ago
And girls.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

gnicholas 3y ago

> Jacob admitted he...had created the video to make money through a sponsorship with a wallet company. How much money would the sponsor have paid, and would it have been worth more than the cost of the crashed plane? I have no idea what planes cost, or how much sponsors pay, but this struck me as unlikely to be profitable (even before the costs of his criminal prosecution).

koromak 3y ago
I think sponsors pay surprisingly well, like 10k for that video wouldn't be unreasonable, and it could be way more. The plane he crashed was a real beater, not worth much at all.
astura 3y ago
The search warrant (posted elsewhere on this thread) answers this question. He bought the plane specifically for this stunt a few weeks before, he did not use his normal plane. He paid $5,000 for the plane and $5,000 for the helicopter recovery of the wreckage. He received $8,000 from the Ridge Wallet sponsorship. Here's the relevant quotes- >Inspector Krantz provided me a receipt he obtained from the company Ridge Wallet. The receipt showed an $8,000 payment to JACOB for the sponsored ad shown on JACOB’s YouTube video. > An FAA Aircraft Bill of Sale for N29508, Taylorcraft BL65, serial number 2351 showed that, effective October 06, 2021, Laura Smith (seller) transferred ownership of the aircraft to JACOB (purchaser). The sale price listed on the form was $5,000. > On January 05, 2022, Sinton provided Krantz a written statement via e-mail. I reviewed the statement and learned the following: (1) JACOB called SINTON a few days before December 10, 2021, to lift his wrecked Taylorcraft airplane out of the forest; (2) JACOB said he was cleared to salvage the plane; (3) On December 10, 2021, Sinton flew his helicopter and met JACOB and a friend at Rancho Siquoc (Santa Maria, California); (4) Sinton flew JACOB and his friend to the wreckage and dropped them off with straps and shackles; (5) Sinton landed in an open field nearby, put on the helicopter long line and returned to the wreckage site; (6) Sinton hooked onto the plane and flew it to JACOB’s trailer; (7) Sinton sent JACOB an invoice for $4,950; and (8) On December 31, 2021, JACOB’s friend “Steve Dozier” paid Sinton $5,000 on behalf of JACOB.

neom 3y ago

I was a little obsessed with this when it happened, here are some good analysis videos if you're interested in Rabbitholing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dghy-yyUMHo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dghy-yyUMHo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YD6m-gVKoYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YD6m-gVKoYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEsXJB8IOzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEsXJB8IOzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EZ3Uom7tFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EZ3Uom7tFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYE7-XSSz0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYE7-XSSz0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PgGvl2ZMFs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PgGvl2ZMFs

koromak 3y ago
That was a fun week

testfoobar 3y ago

Not a pilot. Could he have landed that plane safely in the valley below him from that altitude with a dead engine?

akiselev 3y ago
Yes. There was a nearby dry river bed clearly visible in the video. It's a moot point though because it was a deliberate stunt.
mfkp 3y ago
Yes, multiple people on YouTube recreated the scenario in a flight simulator and found that it could have been landed safely.

ineedasername 3y ago

Seems like yet another game of: Play stupid games; Win stupid prizes ~ Just… stupid

ftxbro 3y ago

I remember being taught about "yellow journalism" in the 1890s history chapter in school. Maybe in the future they will have some name for the kind of influencer culture or sponsored deceptive clickbait youtubing illustrated in this article and they will teach about it in some history chapter in schools.

proxiful-wash 3y ago
What is the reason this is called yellow journalism?
- ftxbro 3y ago
  It's not yellow journalism.
- thaumasiotes 3y ago
  Yellow journalism is named after a frequent theme in the journalism of the time, the yellow peril.
  - bigbillheck 3y ago
    It was the Yellow Kid, actually: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism#Etymology_and_early_usage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism#Etymology_an...

gavinhoward 3y ago

This case infuriates me. At the time, I had just finished sending in an appeal to being denied a medical clearance to become a pilot because of a history of clinical depression. That appeal required undergoing a battery of tests, a psychological evaluation, multiple meetings with a therapist and a report from the same, and 15 hours of flight instruction plus a report of my performance by the flight instructors. I intended to be professional. Everyone thought I was safe to fly. I nevertheless thought the FAA would deny my appeal. I was right. [1] So because I once had clinical depression, I can't get a medical. And yet, yahoos like this get to fly simply because stupidity and malice isn't as well-documented as a history of mental illness. Sigh... To be clear, I don't think the FAA is at fault here; they didn't know, and they acted fast once he did it. They did a great job. I just wish they would let me fly. [1]: https://gavinhoward.com/2022/09/grounded-for-life-losing-the-dream-of-flight/ https://gavinhoward.com/2022/09/grounded-for-life-losing-the...

latchkey 3y ago
Is flying in the US your only option?
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  Now that I have a history with the FAA, I probably couldn't fly international. I also have a wife. I can't just pack up and move to a different country. When the rejection came, I decided my marriage was worth more than flying.
  - latchkey 3y ago
    Yea, I read your post. Having now lived outside of the US for a period of time, I've come to the grand realization that the US is one of the least 'free' countries out there (and I moved to a communist country!). My guess is that if you really wanted to find a way to fly, you could, and it wouldn't require moving. If there is a will, there is a way.
    - gavinhoward 3y ago

throwaway5752 3y ago

What a trash person. Cutting up the plane and distributing the wreckage. They clearly knew it was a crime. I hope they get the upper bounds of the sentencing guidelines.

wodenokoto 3y ago

I’m not trying to insinuate that coming clean would have absolved him, but I do wonder what it would have looked like if he admitted to investigators that he crashed the plane on purpose.

M3L0NM4N 3y ago

Anyone following this from the beginning knew it was fake. Glad he tacked on another charge by pleading guilty to obstruction of the investigation.

epolanski 3y ago
It was beyond obvious: the idea of trying to glide and land to a safe place didn't even scratch his mind which is the standard procedure, and all he did as soon as the engine stopped was to go in parachute mode.
- jnsaff2 3y ago
  yea, amateur hour youtube production too not only disgraceful behavior of a pilot and a human, one could have gotten so much more drama out of actually "trying everything" before "accidentally" finding a parachute in the plane and getting out "at the last moment"

everyone 3y ago

Nice! What an idiot.

sundarurfriend 3y ago

> Trevor Jacob (born August 6, 1993) is an American snowboard cross competitor, extreme sports athlete, YouTuber, and former aircraft pilot. For anyone else wondering if it's a YouTuber they know. It seems more like they're an athlete that dabbles in YouTube and got famous for this one video.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

curiousgal 3y ago

The only shocking thing about the story is him being 29 years old

grecy 3y ago

FWIW, the video of the "crash" has 3 million views, which earned him roughly $30,000 from YouTube direct revenue alone.

jraph 3y ago
How does this compare with the cost the crashed plane?
TMWNN 3y ago
How linear is the scale? I presume that 300,000 views for a video does not give the video's uploader $3,000. (Or does it?) Conversely, would 3 million views = $300,000, or more than that?
- grecy 3y ago
  It's a good approximation to say 1,000 views = $10.

shapefrog 3y ago

Please enter a plead - Not guilty by reason of its a prank bro.

tibbydudeza 3y ago

Well it worked out better than somebody who tried to repeat the telephone book stunt in the Sopranos (Phil Leotardo shoots somebody through a telephone book at close range to make his point about next time) Youtuber forgot it was a tv stunt.

koito17 3y ago

I remember first seeing the video of the guy crashing his plane. It's one of the rare times I opened up yt-dlp just to download the video and archive it, because I was expecting him to take down the video after sufficiently many people caught on to the act. While a maximum of 20 years prison sounds rather harsh, intentionally crashing a plane is no joke or laughing matter. It's unfortunate that things had to end this way. The FAA does not mess around.

sschueller 3y ago
Isn't the punishment not for deliberately crashing but for destroying evidence involving a federal investigation?
- s_dev 3y ago
  The fact that it wasn't a controlled crash it's what's most alarming -- a plane crash could be achieved legally using qualified stunt professionals etc -- he just parachuted out of a plane leaving the plane to it's own devices. While unlikely it's possible that plane could have crashed in to a person killing them.
  - _0ffh 3y ago
    Absolutely! "Irresponsible" doesn't even begin to cover behaviour like that!
  - belter 3y ago
    34°48'53.6"N 119°57'40.4"W was where the airplane hit the ground. If you have a look at Google maps, within a 3 to 4 mile radius, there are multiple kids camping grounds. Even assuming they are only sporadically occupied this is a new level of recklessness.
    - Verdex 3y ago
      I just checked it out on maps.google. Multiple camping grounds here means something like ~15-20 spread out in all directions in addition to some hiking trails. [I watched the video (iirc) about a week after all this originally went down. Watching an airplane just kind of cruise around on its own was pretty horrifying. But I did feel a little bit better that afterwards he had to hike around seemingly forever to find someone to give him a ride. Like, at least things were remote, and he's lucky that he didn't die trying to get back to civilization. However, apparently he thought about this as well, because nope, there's stuff all around that area. This is shooting a gun into the air to see if the bullet will come down and hurt you, but instead of doing it in a dry lake bed you do it right next to a children's hospital so you have someplace to go in case you do get hurt. The other side of hanlon's razor is "sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable from malice".]

jwilk 3y ago

https://archive.today/nhSVy https://archive.today/nhSVy

FreeCodeFreak 3y ago

20 years is outrageous and very unlikely given his probable experience and making sure no one would be hurt. There is a vast difference in crashing an airplane over a populated area, intentionally wanting to cause harm, and it being accident. Afaik this area is not even populated. If such a thing happened by accident, you should not get 20 years. If you did so intentionally wanting to cause harm, them perhaps you should get 20+ years, because that would be an act of terrorism. If someone got killed, you should probably not get your freedom back. Journalists need to always mind the context and emphasize the likelihood of what will be the outcome. It is not really truthful to bluntly state he faces 20 years. If he were to actually get 20, the legal system would obviously be severely flawed. There are murderers that get 20 ffs.

rat9988 3y ago
He has agreed to plead guilty to one count of destruction and concealment with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation, a crime that carries a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison. I find the context very clear. The writer did a superb job.
xd 3y ago
Someone crashing a plane on purpose doesn't amount to terrorism - there would need to be a political motivation as well. Edit: Also the post says up to 20 years .. not sure why you've become fixated on it being simply 20. People dropping planes out of the sky for likes need to be made an example of imo, and I personally would be happy to see him locked up for life as a deterrent to others. The lengths people are going to for likes is frightening.
- jona-f 3y ago
  I just hope you have absolutely no power in this world. You shouldnt have with your total lack of empathy and common sense. Locking an annoying guy away for life for a stupid prank... Nobody got hurt. And you're not even alone and don't even get downvoted like crazy. American society sure is fucked up.
  - 3y ago

d--b 3y ago

The one question no one seems to ask is: are youtube views really worth a plane? Did this guy also try to defraud his insurance?

jnsaff2 3y ago
There was a sponsorship deal with a wallet company involved. Airworthy planes seem to start from around $20k so it may even work out. Tho the intelligence of the guy doing it seems not to be brightest so I would not rule out it being a lose-lose situation out of stupidity.
sharkbird2 3y ago
I think they could be, if they lead to subscriptions and long-term success for his channel. Not saying it was in any way ethically justifiable, just that from a purely machiavellian perspective I think it could make sense.

bambax 3y ago

> Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. Marvelous! Like an ordinary criminal trying to dispose of the body. He may have thought no body, no crime? but that doesn't work very well when said crime is filmed start to finish and published on Youtube...

b112 3y ago
He may have thought no body, no crime? He may have, or maybe he thought he did nothing wrong, which is why he had it on youtube. And so he disposed of the plane wreckage, as he needed to, lest he be fined, and he cut it up so it would fit in the bins.
- bambax 3y ago
  He was a licensed pilot. It's unlikely he thought he hadn't done anything wrong. He also repeatedly told the FAA and the NTSB he didn't know where the plane was -- whilst he was in fact cutting it up in his garage...
  - jaystraw 3y ago
    imo, he knew what he was doing was illegal, but didn't think it was wrong.
madeofpalk 3y ago
...or if you call the 'Police' before and tell them you crashed!
lt_kernelpanic 3y ago
Airbeas Corpus
ithkuil 3y ago
"The video was just a deep fake, your honour"
caskstrength 3y ago

jacquesm 3y ago

There were two of these, one guy crashing his plane over land (this guy) and another iirc that did the same thing over the sea. Anybody know what happened with that second guy?

cogogo 3y ago
The other one was suspicious but not so much evidence it was a stunt. https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/on-video-guy-ditches-plane-in-pacific-suspicions-run-rampant/ https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/on-video-guy-ditche...
- jacquesm 3y ago
  That one definitely endangered someone else as well.

nraynaud 3y ago

A bit of context is that the FAA doesn't want plane crashes at all (unless you're NASA), even "safe ones" because of the public image, so it's extremely difficult to get a waiver for a stunt if there is a real risk of crashing an airplane, even if it's empty and as safe as possible, it's not about safety, it's about public image. People afraid of flying are a very difficult crowd to manage.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Dah00n 3y ago
Huh, managing people sounds very ominous.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
SirMaster 3y ago
Surely they crash real planes in movies from time-to-time no? Or is it really always all CGI?
- capableweb 3y ago
  Yes, there are real planes sometimes used in movie stunts for doing crashes, it's not all CGI, although most is, doing real things like that costs a lot of money. But regardless, if "not scaring fly-scared people" was actually a concern, any planes crashing in movies would be forbidden, not just real planes crashing in movies. But it's not.
  - piker 3y ago
    Not likely given the broad sweep of the First Amendment. Much easier for the FAA to deny a license to crash a plane under various safety rationales than to say "you can't show that because of the message" in the United States. The latter is almost certainly unconstitutional.
- 3y ago

Namari 3y ago

Taken from youtube comments: > For anyone wondering why the FAA yanked his license. 1) attached multiple cameras to the craft (not illegal but suspect) 2) Wearing a sports parachute (there uncomfortable as hell and he never wore any chute on any other flight) 3) opened the side door before claiming any engine failure. 4) made no attempt to restart engine 5) made no attempt to find a safe landing spot even though there were multiple landing areas in easy gliding distance 6) jumped out of the plan with a selfie stick which is not normal behaviour during a crisis . 7) Made his way to the wreck and took all the cameras 8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities . 9) made no attempt to communicate on emergency frequency None of which deals with the fact he had fire extinguishers strapped to his legs since that not technically illegal or the deliberate crashing of his plane into national reserve.

capableweb 3y ago
> 8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities . Not just disposed, but disposed in multiple locations: > two weeks after the drama he and a friend winched the wreckage out of the forest with a helicopter, [...] Over the next few days, he cut up the plane into small pieces, and dumped the parts in trash bins in and around Lompoc City Airport. [...] In a plea agreement, Jacob admitted he had intended to obstruct federal authorities when he disposed of the wreckage
- hef19898 3y ago
  I get, from his point of view, that he removed the cameras. But the plane wreckage? How stupid can people be...
- plorg 3y ago
  >8) had the wreck disposed of before contact the authorities Worse, he reported the incident to the FAA, who asked him for the location and told him not to disturb the wreck (they told him more than once). He then disposed of the plane and continued telling the FAA/NTSB he didn't know where it was.
belter 3y ago

acd 3y ago

Youtube acts as social media. Its an attention economy. I think there is something wrong with advertisement combined with social media. What I think is wrong is that as long as there are viewers algoritms promotes content which get a lot of viewers.

mcfedr 3y ago

What is the sponsor getting? They presumably knew what they were paying for, a hefty fine in their direction seems very appropriate

omega3 3y ago

They should follow the money and look into the sponsor as well.

pm3003 3y ago

He's a top contender for the Internet's most hated person....

fatneckbeard 3y ago

It's funny how if you are a major corporation with fat government contracts you can systematically destroy your engineering department, ostracize whistleblowers, and wind up killing hundreds of people and nobody gets punished and the FAA will even be on your side, like the Boeing thing. but if you make a youtube stunt that hurts nobody you can get 20 years in prison and the FAA acts like you besmirched the stellar reputation of the aviation industry.

jjallen 3y ago
Both should suffer serious consequences IMO. Boeing more so.
- akudha 3y ago
  Yes, but 20 years for this dude is a bit excessive, no? Especially when nobody was killed or injured?
  - wartijn_ 3y ago
    The 20 years is not for crashing his plane, but for "one count of destruction and concealment with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation"
    - jstanley 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - eppp 3y ago
        We all are. Pests like this are a drain on our entire government and society. How many hours have been wasted on this stupid stunt that was entirely his doing for no reason at all. He then tried to cover it up and lied about it. He wasted our time this morning reading about it again because he is a selfish liar.
        3y ago

3327 3y ago

[dead]

ectospheno 3y ago

Thought exercise: List all crimes for which five years in prison would be a deterrent for you but one year in prison would not. My list is zero entries. Perhaps sentencing guidelines are just us spanking people and not actually a deterrent. Please post your list when responding.

mongol 3y ago
I mean, most people are not interested in doing crimes, no matter the sentence. Do you expect someone to say, "cool, only one year for burglary, what a steal!"
- ectospheno 3y ago
  Yes... that is the point...

atum47 3y ago

I think the 20 years is more to make an example out of him. In those days where people eat soap, put themselves in danger, harass police officers and even crash planes to get views / attention, this kind of sentence will put fear in people, I think.

can16358p 3y ago

It was a terrible and a stupid, not-well-though stunt. Absolutely terrible. Though, what damage other than crashed debris in a remote land, is exactly done? Not to support the act anyway, but as long as no one got hurt, one may not face 20 years jail time for crashing their own plane in a remote land. Stupid? Absolutely. Illegal? Shouldn't be.

shadowgovt 3y ago
He's not facing 20 years of jail time for crashing the plane. That would have been revocation of his license and possibly some time for reckless endangerment. He's facing 20 years of jail time for wanton destruction of evidence and impeding a federal investigation. The FAA doesn't have the resources to launch a deep detective dive on every crash, and the penalties are set to highly discourage the practice of impeding understanding of what happened in a crash because that's part of the process of making the air safer for everyone (ground-side as well as air-side). Even the wreck itself, in its undisturbed state, would have been valuable for better understanding of how an uncontrolled plane meets its end (including possible opportunities to improve the safety of the inevitable disassembly when it finds the ground). ... unless some likes-hound cuts the plane up into tiny pieces and tries to hide it.
hermannj314 3y ago
Your desire is that reckless disregard for human life, tampering with evidence and lying on official government documents aren't crimes unless a person is physically hurt? Got it, most people in our democracy disagree with you, but feel free to vote in the next election.
- kurisufag 3y ago
  your comment is unhelpful and unnecessarily aggressive. a better way to express the same sentiment would be pointing out the reasons that evidence tampering, despite not having an immediate victim, can be harmful.
  - hermannj314 3y ago

PaulHoule 3y ago

See https://abcnews.go.com/2020/marcus-schrenker-fake-death/story?id=10201960 https://abcnews.go.com/2020/marcus-schrenker-fake-death/stor...

solotronics 3y ago

Is it actually even illegal to crash a plane on purpose? Plane companies do this all the time for testing purposes, albeit in a controlled manner.

93po 3y ago

Another story of why you should never talk to the police (or investigators of any kind). This kid would have been fine if he didn't fucking say anything to them.

mdwalters 3y ago

youtubers nowadays would do anything for a sponsorship