The University of Southern California has filed a lawsuit against Ernest Kanevsky and Yuguo Bai, who filmed pranks on campus for Youtube videos.
The pair, who are not USC students, allegedly filmed themselves disrupting classes at the university. A judge granted the school a restraining order, banning Kanevsky and Bai from the campus, The Guardian reports.
According to The Daily Trojan, Kanevsky and Bai have staged three classroom takeovers since 2021. Their subscribers suggest the pranks to the Youtubers as dares.
Attorneys for the university say the pranks often led to students fleeing classrooms for fear of their lives, The Los Angeles Times reports.
In one incident, on March 29, Kanevsky entered a classroom during a lecture on the Holocaust dressed as a Russian mafia boss. Bai was already seated in the room. According to The Daily Trojan, Kanevsky asked Bai if Hugo Boss, a fashion designer he said made Nazi uniforms, was in the room. Bai replied that he was Hugo Boss. Kanevsky said his father owed him money. Students then fled the classroom.
“I was near the door and I started running out,” one student told USC Annenberg Media. “Everyone just left in a really big panic.”
Kanevsky and Bai were later arrested at gunpoint after the prank.
Kanevsky has over 100,000 subscribers on Youtube, where he posts videos of the pranks. Bai does not appear to have his own channel.
The pair did not reply to requests for comment from The Guardian about the case. A preliminary injunction hearing has been for April 28, according to The Los Angeles Times.
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