Navy sailor, 29, and her boyfriend, 25, 'baited thieves by leaving bicycles in their front yard, only to beat them with aluminum baseball bats and post videos of the assaults on YouTube' (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7875287/California-couple-arrested-left-bikes-yard-lure-thieves-beat-them.html)
Visalia couple accused of baiting, beating thieves cleared of criminal wrongdoing (https://abc30.com/visalia-couple-accused-of-baiting-beating-thieves-cleared-of-criminal-wrongdoing-/6233955/)
Short version -
They left bikes in their front yard and watched from a hidden location.
Some criminal comes along and tries to steal the bike. They jump out and beat the criminal with baseball bats.
They post videos to YouTube of their exploits.
The police find out about this from the YouTube videos. The police arrest the couple for assault.
The DA declines to press charges stating that in order to press charges he needs the cooperation of the criminal victims, which means granting immunity.
They got away with it.
I'm not quite sure how I feel about this one.
How many people went by and didn't molest the bikes? Those jokers got what was coming to them. Trespass/ theft- drop the bike and split.
I think the couple should have been convicted of assault. This was not a situation where the couple was surprised by someone stealing their bike and then reacted with aggression. This was a scheme to justify assaulting someone with baseball bats so they could post it online, garner attention, and make money. Of course the theives should be charged with theft-- this isn't a situation where one party is wrong and the other is right, both were wrong.
The DA explained the problem of trying the couple for assault - they'd need the cooperation of the victims. That makes it quite difficult.
Some one has to teach them not to steal; only lucky they didn't get themselves shot in the process.