A YouTube prankster who was shot while being filmed has been placed in intensive care.
When a brawl started, Tanner Cook was in the middle of filming a video in the Virginia retail center Dulles Town Centre.
It’s unknown what the joke entailed, but Tanner, 21, has previously invited strangers to play naked Twister for his videos and faked to puke on an Uber driver.
Alan Colie, 31, the suspect, was charged with aggravated malicious wounding, using a firearm to commit a crime, and firing a handgun within a structure.
Tanner was taken to hospital and remained in intensive care after the bullet pierced his stomach and liver, Mail Online reports.
He spoke to WUSA9 from his hospital bed and he said he had been playing a prank on Colie for YouTube channel ‘Classified Goons’, which has around 40,000 subscribers.
Tanner said: ‘I was playing a prank and a simple practical joke, and this guy didn’t take it very well.’
A friend of Tanner’s was recording the video, which has now been seized by police as evidence, and despite his injury Tanner says he will not be deterred from making prank videos.
Jeramy Cook, Tanner’s father, described the incident as ‘shocking and unnecessary’.
‘They were making a video at the mall and trying to have fun with people and this guy wasn’t having fun,’ he said.
‘There was a phone that was around him and they were interviewing or talking to him, and he didn’t like it and he pulled out his gun and shot my son.
‘I pray for this young man and pray that he finds God in this. I believe that God saved our son’s life, and he could have easily died but that’s not the outcome. God has plans for my son.’
The shopping mall reopened on Monday having been shut down for a full day following the incident.