Man who shot YouTuber on video at Dulles Town Center found not guilty by jury
LEESBURG, Va. — After two days of testimony, the man who shot a 21-year-old YouTuber inside Dulles Town Center on video in April has been found not guilty on two charges of malicious wounding.
The jury found Alan Colie not guilty of aggravated malicious wounding or use of a firearm for aggravated malicious wounding, however, he was found guilty of firing a gun inside the mall. That guilty verdict has been set aside until a hearing to discuss it on October 19.
Colie, a DoorDash driver, was on trial for shooting Tanner Cook, the man behind the YouTube channel "Classified Goons," at the Dulles Town Center back in April. Colie admitted to shooting Cook when he took the stand Wednesday but claimed it was self-defense.
The case went viral not because there was a shooting inside a mall, but because Cook is known to make prank videos. Cook amassed 55,000 subscribers with an average income of up to $3,000 per month. He said he elicits responses to entertain viewers and called his pranks “comedy content.”
Colie faced three charges, including aggravated malicious wounding, malicious discharge of a firearm within an occupied dwelling, and use of firearm for aggravated malicious wounding. The jury had to weigh different factors including if Colie had malicious intent and had reasonable fear of imminent danger of bodily harm.
Cook was in the courtroom when jurors were shown footage of him getting shot near the stomach -- a video that has not yet been made public. Cook's mother, however, left the courtroom to avoid watching the key piece of evidence in her son's shooting.
The footage was recorded by one of Cook's friends, who was helping to record a prank video for Cook's channel. The video shows Cook holding his phone near Colie’s ear and using Google Translate to play a phrase out loud four times, while Colie backed away.
When he testified, Colie recalled how Cook and his friend approached him from behind and put the phone about 6 inches away from his face. He described feeling confused by the phrase Cook was playing. Colie told the jury the two looked “really cold and angry.” He also acknowledged carrying a gun during work as a way to protect himself after seeing reports of other delivery service drivers being robbed.
"Colie walked into the mall to do his job with no intention of interacting with Tanner Cook. None," Adam Pouilliard, Colie's defense attorney, said. "He’s sitting next to his defense attorneys right now. How’s that for a consequence?”
The Commonwealth argued that Cook was never armed, never placed hands on Colie and never posed a threat. They stressed that just because Cook may not seem like a saint or his occupation makes him appear undesirable, that a conviction is warranted.
"We don’t like our personal space invaded, but that does not justify the ability to shoot someone in a public space during an interaction that lasted for only 20 seconds," Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Eden Holmes said.
The jury began deliberating around 11:30 a.m. Thursday. Shortly after 3:30 p.m., the jury came back saying they were divided and couldn’t come to a resolution. The judge instructed them to continue deliberating and later returned with the not-guilty verdict.
WUSA9 caught up with the Cook family following the verdict. When we asked Tanner Cook how he felt about the outcome, he said it is all up to God.
"I really don't care, I mean it is what it is," he said. "It's God's plan at the end of the day."
His mother, Marla Elam, said the family respects the jury and that the Cook family is just thankful Tanner is alive.
"Nothing else matters right now," she said.
Here's the video by NBC Washington, apologies that it's served by Discord
The nutjob is the one accosting strangers in the mall for youtube content.
A situation can have multiple nutjobs.
Yes, yes it can. In this situation, we have one normal guy just trying to live his life in peace. We have one nutjob harassing him for the lulz and giggles from like minded nutjobs. Finally, there's a second nutjob defending his behavior right here on this very forum.
why do you think it's normal to shoot at people in this case?
Nobody said it was normal. The fact is that it is legally justifiable to shoot at someone, in self-defense, who was assaulting them.
Whether you or anyone likes it or not is irrelevant.
hey buddy, at least we agree on something 🎉
Yet another thing you’ve imagined.
I suggest you give up. You’re not going to score a “win” here.
give up on what? I don't care about pointless discussions with strangers, but you seem so invested. I only asked a question and you answered. So long
If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t keep replying.
why do you think it's normal to shoot at people in this case?
You're being disingenuous. It's not a normal situation, therefore there is no normal response.
The question you ought to be asking is what makes it normal to be approached from behind by two large men and repeatedly accosted by them shoving a loud phone in your ear?
They asked you a very clear question, what about this makes it normal or ok to shoot someone?
Being confused and paranoid is not justifiable reason to shoot someone.
Honestly, you guys are acting like a fucking old person with a gun is allowed to shoot every trans person they see because it's confusing and scary and they're not sure how to respond.
It is not normal to behave aggressively towards someone, get within range to hit them, and then repeatedly close in when the other person tries to backs away. It is not normal for cis people and it is not normal for trans people.
When someone does those things, it generally signals they intend to start a fight.
I gave a very clear answer. Perhaps you should spend some time working on your reading comprehension.
You're also building straw men. Nobody's mentioned age, nor transsexuals, nor paranoia, nor confusing, nor scary... except you.
Quit trolling.
The literal argument you're making is that he felt scared so hes justified shooting the kid.
Just like that old man who shot the black boy who knocked on the wrong door.
What's different? If all that matters is whether the victim gets scared and confused then that racist old fuck was justified right?
There you go again, building straw men. There's a significant difference between being assaulted by two large men versus having a boy standing behind a door on a porch.
If you can't see that, you need professional help. If you're trying to troll, you're doing a shitty job of it.
Oh I'm sorry, I thought all that matter was whether or not the victim felt scared?
The victim was assaulted. That’s what matters.
The victim was assaulted.
The victim clearly communicated his desire for the interaction to end. Several times.
The victim attempted to flee the situation. Several times.
The victim attempted physical resistance.
After all this, he still had two physically imposing people forcing confrontation on him. He clearly did not just the bare minimum but in fact pretty much did everything that anyone ever asks a self-defense shooting defender to do before resorting to a gun.
Even in this thread, all these people who can't stand the thought of this poor guy being not guilty can't really come up with any further reasonable thing they'd have expected this guy to do. He was out of options to peacefully end the situation.
The other big thing that so many armchair quarterbacks here don't seem to account for is just how fast and how unpredictable dangerous encounters happen. The fact that there were two attackers, and that they were both bigger than the victim and both within 10 feet of him meant that if they decided at any moment to escalate their assault to violence, by the time the victim realized that's what was about to happen (if he even did realize it before it began) it was already too late. They'd be able to close the distance and physically restrain him before he'd have time to draw, aim, and fire.
Sure, we all know now that this idiot was just an idiot and not a violent threat, but the victim didn't have that benefit of hindsight, and in the situation, he knew he was being targeted and that if he waited for violence to happen to him, it'd be too late. Too many here want to pick it all apart and think it over for a few hours, then say what the victim should have done with his mere seconds to figure it out.
If anything, he showed incredible restraint. He repeatedly attempted to deescalate, to no avail, and even when making the decision to use his gun in self defense, he immediately stopped once the immediate threat was addressed, and then shifted back to a less lethal form of deescalation: retreat.
Being realistic, if the moron attacker is already well enough to attend the trial, that's even pretty low damage. He's lucky for that shot placement (intentional or not).
Imagine the comments here if, instead of being a gun carrier, the guy was some kind of martial arts dude and instead of shooting him, he punched him in the face or something and when he went down, he hit his head and died. Nobody would be demonizing the guy then, even though he fucking killed a guy. That people are doing it now shows that they're just so anti-gun that details and logic don't matter.
Because 9/10 times you punch a guy they don't die, 9/10 times you shoot a guy in the chest they do.
Jesus christ, try thinking with your brain before you unload a wall of bullshit defending dumb as fuck gun culture. The entire rest of the world lives their lives without being strapped all day and immediately resorting to deadly force like paranoid wack jobs.
Sure, then we look at which nut job started the problem, and a jury of his peers figured out that it wasn’t the shooter
If it's before a jury we look at which nutjob escalated the situation from a public nuisance misdeamour to an attempted murder felony.
So how should he have responded to 2 dudes shoving a phone in his face and harassing him repeatedly even after backing away from them and being told to stop several times ?
You could try walking away, if that doesn't work try running.
What do you think "backing away" means? You expect people to turn their backs on people who're potentially dangerous to them?
After 20 fucking seconds? Pick literally anything other than trying to end their lives. Wtf is wrong with you?
What option was left to him besides violence? He asked them to stop. He tried to get away from them. What's left?
Continue to try getting away from them for more than 20s... is this a fucking joke question?
Have you ever been assaulted by someone? It doesn't take any time at all for the situation to go from what they were doing to violence. At which point he would have been screwed. He gave them ample opportunity to fuck off. 20 seconds of someone getting in your face and being aggressive feels a hell of a lot longer than 20 seconds sitting on your ass arguing with people on the internet.
And ending a life is fucking permanent. Grow the fuck up.
If they'd ended his it would have been permanent too.
Do you think that such legal prose runs through the minds of people in the heat of the moment? You really expect people to look at things in such a clinical manner when they're under immediate perceived threat? You think too much of humans and too little of people.
Lmao, the guy played a cellphone in his face and you're acting like he pulled a knife on him.
And you continue to choose to lack empathy and engage in bad faith. Well, I'll clearly miss nothing blocking you.
Go ahead and block people who disagree with you, bubbles are comforting.
Thank you for confirming you're just trolling. My days of not taking you seriously have certain come to a middle.
Lmao, go ahead and dismiss people who disagree with you as trolling, bubbles are comforting.
Whether you disagree or not is irrelevant. The fact that the victim was assaulted is all that matters, as it legally justifies the self-defense. Whether you like it or not has nothing to do with it.
If you want to make a legal argument go pass the bar, we're talking moral and ethics here (you know the thing most people discuss day to day).
I don’t need to pass the bar to make a legal argument here— a jury ruled the use of force legal in this case, whether you like it or not.
No matter how much you debate that, the fact remains the fact.
I'm curious to know if more people agree with your view that shooting someone doesn't seem like a proportional response based on what we know, ot if the YouTubers deserves it.
This is very coutry-specific. I think we're seeing some cultural shock on different sides in this thread.
Emotional it’s a totally proportional response according to what the pranksters did to him. Humiliating people can easily provoke them to act aggressively. Especially people of low status who can’t afford a lawsuit. Every police officer knows that.
But of course a human society should have laws to prevent its members from this kind of situations.
It should be illegal to provoke, assault, harass, disrespect , threaten, or humiliate anybody in the way those pranksters did.
And it should be illegal for any random guy to carry a loaded and unlocked gun around in his pocket.
But because neither is illegal in the United States, the number of gun victims there is more similar to that in war zones.
And obviously none of the Americans in this thread give a shit about the social problematics of the case and rather fight irreconcilably over defending or blaming the shooter.