Viral Tesla crash sparked LAPD investigation just after influencer claimed he was powering stunt

Los Angeles law enforcement are hunting for the human being guiding a latest stunt captured on video clip in which a driver of a Tesla sped above a hill and crashed into two other automobiles.

Law enforcement officials to begin with provided a $1,000 reward for information and facts about the particular person at the rear of the crash. But they have considering the fact that asked the community to cease contacting into their suggestion line to report influencer Dominykas Zeglaitis, also known as Durte Dom, as a suspect.

“We have been given over 50 ideas and foresee a lot more owing the story heading viral,” officials mentioned in a tweet from the @LAPDCTD account. “Over 90% of the ideas are of the identical person who has a TikTok handle of @dominykas or @durtedom on Twitter. He is regarded a human being of curiosity primarily based on the general public postings on his account.”

Zeglaitis, a controversial social media personality who was when component of influencer David Dobrik’s Vlog Squad, initially posted videos of the incident to his social media accounts, which include TikTok, claiming to be component of the crash. Following some influencers disputed his involvement, he posted a YouTube video clip saying his statements had been section of a prank.

Zeglaitis did not straight away answer to a request for remark. Police claimed they have reached out to him on social media.

Zeglaitis claimed duty for the incident on his TikTok profile, where by he experienced 2.7 million followers, which now seems to be deleted.

“I just crashed my new Tesla,” he wrote in textual content that appeared around online video of him guiding the wheel ahead of a shot of the vehicle traveling through the air.

The video has been taken off from TikTok. Just before it was eradicated, it experienced amassed a lot more than 11 million views. A spokesperson for TikTok directed NBC Information to the platform’s group pointers against dangerous acts and problems, which point out that the system does not allow “users to share articles depicting, marketing, normalizing or glorifying unsafe functions that might lead to significant harm or dying.”

In one more movie, Zeglaitis claimed he was intoxicated though driving. He also posted a video mocking the Los Angeles Law enforcement Office, composing, “LAPD didn’t like my stunt,” with the song “F— Tha Police” by N.W.A taking part in in the background. His most new movie on the account was a clip of a information report about the stunt in which he captions the TikTok video clip “look mother i’m well known.”

Police have not introduced a description of the driver. The crash is considered to have taken spot early Sunday in Los Angeles’ Echo Park.

Baxter Road, exactly where the incident occurred, is regarded the steepest hill in Los Angeles, and it has been a site for people hunting to report perilous stunts.

In movies of the incident, the individual behind the wheel drives a rented 2018 Tesla S-BLM in excess of a highway with a steep drop, heading so quick that the auto results in being airborne as it breaches the hill. It then arrives crashing down on to the floor, with parts of the car shattering and detaching as onlookers history.

Law enforcement say the automobile hit trash cans and two other cars. The Tesla was deserted at the scene. Law enforcement have considered the incident a misdemeanor strike-and-operate.

Some claimed Zeglaitis was not at the scene, before he admitted it himself

Zeglaitis has been at the center of controversy just before.

In March 2021, Insider printed a report including rape allegations that an nameless female created in opposition to Zeglaitis. Insider gave the accuser the alias “Hannah.” Hannah said Zeglaitis had sex with her in November 2018 when she was drunk to the place of “blacking out” and unable to consent. In September, Zeglaitis denied the rape allegations in a YouTube video.

In November, two additional females accused Zeglaitis of sexual misconduct in another Insider article. Zeglaitis has not responded to any other distinct allegations of sexual misconduct, but in 2017 he apologized to unnamed ladies who he mentioned he had aggressively sexually pursued.

Zeglaitis, who has continued to submit stunts and pranks on TikTok and YouTube, has also applied his accounts to share films of wild stunts, which he often falsely promises as his have.

Before Zeglaitis admitted that his claims were aspect of a prank, some influencers claimed he wasn’t current when the Tesla stunt transpired and that he stole the movie to get clout.

Law enforcement said that when 90 % of the recommendations they have received have been about Zeglaitis, the other 10 percent have been about automobile YouTubers Alex Choi and Chaz Warren, equally of whom shared videos of the incident to their social media accounts.

“this new traveling tesla application update is heading crazy,” Choi wrote in a video clip of the motor vehicle.

Choi later on posted to his Instagram tale expressing Zeglaitis was not current when the stunt transpired.

“DURTE DOM DID NOT Jump THE TESLA” he wrote. “Not absolutely sure why he’s lying to all people and indicating he did … I was there, saw everything and he was not even there.”

Choi and Warren did not straight away reply to a request for remark.

Bianca Britton contributed.