On Saturday afternoon, YouTube personality Jake Paul tweeted something emotional and slightly cryptic. “I love depleting my serotonin and then getting tons of anxiety,” he wrote. A few hours later, he appeared in footage that seemed to make his mental state a bit more clear. In a video Paul posted personally, captioned “america is in ruins,” he discussed being tear-gassed by the police at a peaceful protest. On the Instagram of his videographer Andrew Blue, Paul appeared in videos taken inside Scottsdale Fashion Square, a huge upscale mall in suburban Arizona, as trespassers began stealing property from closed stores.
The Arizona Republic reports that 12 people were arrested at the mall on suspicion of burglary on Saturday night. Neither Paul nor Blue was among them. According to the paper, hundreds converged after a viral post called for action following local protests against police brutality. Those involved shattered and defaced windows at stores including Urban Outfitters, David’s Bridal, and Apple. The Phoenix chapter of Black Lives Matter, which helped organized the original protest, said it was not involved in the action.
A first wave of criticism hit Paul on Sunday morning, and he posted a statement denying involvement in any looting, which has taken place in numerous cities as protests over the death of George Floyd continue. “For context, we spent the day doing our part to peacefully protest one of the most horrific injustices our country has ever seen, which led us to being tear-gassed for filming the events and brutality that were unfolding in Arizona,” he wrote. “I do not condone violence, looting, or breaking the law; however, I understand the anger and frustration that led to the destruction.”
Blue’s videos, however, show a broken window at a P.F. Chang restaurant; later Paul appears holding what looks to be a bottle of P.F. Chang-branded vodka.
Though 23-year-old Jake Paul has long avoided some of the backlash courted by his older brother, Logan, he has a history of using news stories about suffering to create content. Just a few months before Logan attracted widespread revulsion for his tasteless foray into Aokigahara, Japan’s infamous “suicide forest,” Jake concocted a harebrained scheme to “save” Houston from the effects of Hurricane Harvey.
After causing a near-stampede in a Walmart parking lot, Jake did manage to collect two U-Haul trucks full of donations, which he later handed out to people in a submerged neighborhood on the back of a jetski. In one video, he made a grandiose comment that sums up his humanitarian impulse: “We are going to get them supplies, we are going to save their lives, and we’re going to flippin’ vlog it, all at once.”