TikTok Stars ‘The Stokes Twins’ Are Facing Felony Charges
Some social media influencers are experiencing their fair share of issues right now, with the Stokes Twins being the latest.
Jake Paul’s home was raided by the FBI, Ramon Abbas was arrested for alleged money laundering, and now Alan and Alex Stokes are facing legal woes. The famous TikTok twins are in hot water with local authorities.
Who are the Stokes Twins?
23-year-old Alan and Alex Stokes are known for posting viral challenges and prank videos on YouTube and TikTok. Together, they’ve amassed more than 25 million followers on TikTok and 4 million on YouTube. With such a large audience, they’re frequent guests at events such as the VMAs and Kids’ Choice Awards.
Scroll through any of their social media accounts and you’ll find countless posts of them doing silly or questionable stunts that sometimes attract the police’s attention. That’s exactly what happened with Orange County authorities.
Alan and Alex Stokes charged with felony crime
One of their “pranks” caught up to them and on Aug. 5, the Stokes Twins were charged with felony false imprisonment and swatting. They were also hit with a misdemeanor.
According to a press release from the Orange County District Attorney, the charges are linked to pranks they committed in October 2019.
During one incident, they allegedly dressed in black attire and ski masks and proceeded to run away from a bank with a duffel filled with cash. They pretended to run from a robbery scene as someone filmed the entire ordeal.
They then ordered an Uber and the driver refused to accept the ride as he thought they committed a crime.
A witness assumed the twins were attempting to carjack the driver and called the police. Once they arrived, they held the Uber driver at gunpoint. After he was released, the cops warned the Stokes about their behavior.
Per the Orange County D.A., they allegedly did the same thing again hours later on a college campus in Irvine, California.
“These were not pranks,” said Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer in a formal statement. “These are crimes that could have resulted in someone getting seriously injured or even killed. Law enforcement officers are sworn to protect the public and when someone calls 911 to report an active bank robbery they are going to respond to protect lives. Instead, what they found was some kind of twisted attempt to gain more popularity on the internet by unnecessarily putting members of the public and police officers in danger.”
The maximum penalty is four years in prison if convicted.
The Stokes Twins have a history of public pranks
Though the video has since been taken down, it showed police officers telling them to keep their pranking activities contained to a closed space.
This way, members of the public wouldn’t be tricked into believing a serious crime occurred. But Alex and Alan Stokes have done similar deeds in the past and continue to do them in open areas.
Here’s an example of them performing dares in public in 2020.
Each of them faces the charges individually and so far, they haven’t issued a statement about the cases.
