5 Things Minnesota Couple Did On YouTube Before She Shot Him

Monalisa Perez and Pedro Ruiz III wanted people to look. The Halstad, Minnesota, couple starred in their own reality show on Perez’s YouTube channel, pulling pranks and challenges for 11,470 subscribers and millions of people who have shared the “vlog.” It all ended tragically, of course. Their last stunt went horribly wrong when Ruiz, 22, held a book in front of his chest while Perez, 19, fired a gun from about a foot away. Perez told police she had done a trial run and shot another book, and it stopped the bullet.

The book did not protect Ruiz when the cameras were rolling, and he died. Now she’s facing second-degree murder charges and could go to prison for 10 years if convicted. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Minneapolis Patch, or click here to find your local Minnesota Patch. Also, if you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Perez had teased about it Monday on Twitter, tweeting that she and Ruiz were planning “one of the most dangerous videos” ever. #Understatement.

In a bizarre twist, Ruiz had said in a previous challenge video that fans should send stunt ideas and that he was “OK with dying.” The video was their “whisper challenge,” which Perez won, along with the right to wax his armpit.

Here are five other things they had done in the YouTube videos:

On June 22, Perez and Ruiz were fighting, but they made up in time to do “scary pranks at the fair.”

Perez, who is pregnant, had been sick with a cold, according to a June 19 video, but the family went to her mother’s for the weekend and almost got stuck by the river.

In a May 30 video, she poured melted candle wax on him while he slept.

In a May 26 video, Perez and Ruiz engaged in a blindfold challenge called the “Touch My Body Challenge (Pregnant Edition).”

In a June 1 video, Perez turned what she called the “world’s hottest pepper prank” around on Ruiz. He had ordered some hot peppers, and she figured he planned to prank her, so laced his sandwich with them. He came down with a nasty case of heartburn.

“You can’t mess with me, baby boy,” Perez said on the video.

Image via YouTube