I love a good prank, so long as no one gets hurt or humiliated. I have my limits.

But seeing a good prank go off can be something of a thing of beauty. I didn’t always feel that way, but as I’ve aged, I appreciate them more and more.

However, a couple of guys in Valdosta, Georgia say they were just carrying out a prank recently, and there was nothing to appreciate about it.

On January 7, 2022, at approximately 6:30 pm., Valdosta Police Officers responded to a motel in the 2100 block of West Hill Avenue, after a citizen called E911 to report that they had observed a possible armed robbery. The citizen stated that two males were observed pointing handguns at two females and they forced the females into a motel room. When officers arrived on the scene, officers responded to the room while another officer watched video surveillance from the motel. The surveillance video showed two males, later identified as Javant Calton and Latroye Irvin, standing in front of their motel room pointing handguns in different directions. Then as a vehicle pulled up to the motel, both males pointed their handguns at the vehicle. The officer observed the two females go into the motel room while handguns were being pointed at them.

Officers entered the motel room and found Irvin, Calton, Akeria Anderson, and Skylor Thomas, along with another 19-year-old female. Officers also recovered two handguns that were hidden under a mattress.

Through investigation, all of the subjects stated that they were just playing around and no robbery had occurred.

These guys were playing around with actual firearms. This was supposed to be some kind of prank?

How stupid can you get?

Irvin found himself arrested for possession of a firearm under first offender–a felony–as well as reckless conduct, a misdemeanor. Unsurprisingly, he also had an active arrest warrant. Calton was arrested for reckless conduct. Anderson and Thomas were both arrested for active arrest warrants.

In other words, Calton was the only one of the four who didn’t have an active warrant against him.

Honestly, this is beyond stupid. Especially with actual firearms.

I mean, even if it really was meant in some demented kind of fun–and I’m not convinced of that, personally, regardless of what the women said to police–it still could have gotten them killed. Georgia is a Stand Your Ground state where you can use lethal force to stop a forceable felony from occurring. That includes robbery.

This “playing around” could have resulted in a very real shooting had someone seen it and intervened.

Of course, then we’d be hearing about how they were good boys who didn’t mean anything by it and how Stand Your Ground is really a problem and Georgia should do away with it, but for at least some of these guys? That wouldn’t matter because they’d be dead.

And frankly, I wouldn’t have a lot of sympathy for them.

I’ve always believed that stupid should hurt, and this is the epitome of stupid. Maybe the charges will hurt enough they’ll rethink things the next time they decide to prank a couple of women with guns. Especially real firearms.