Kanghua Ren, a YouTube prankster, filled Oreo cookies with toothpaste instead of cream and gave them to a homeless man in Barcelona. This incident took place in 2017 when he was aged 19. Ren who goes by the name ReSet on YouTube will now be facing 15 months in prison. He will also have to pay his victim $22300. Ren’s social media channels will be closed for the next 5 years. Considering that Ren is a first time offender, his crime is nonviolent and the sentence is less than 2 years, his prison term may be suspended.

After being challenged by one of his subscribers, Ren gave the man the cookies with toothpaste and a $20 note. The man vomited after eating the cookie. Ren was found guilty of violating the moral integrity of the 52-year-old man identified as Gheorge L. who said he has "never been treated so poorly while living on the street."

The video was not received well. Following this, Ren visited the man again and offered him $20. To evade legal action against him, he offered Gheorge’s daughter $300. He said: “I do things to mount a show: People like what is morbid” justifying his actions. While he said that it was a bad joke for which he tried to make amends, Ren also said that the positive side was that: “This will help clean his teeth — I don’t think he has cleaned them since he became poor,” which seems quite insensitive.

Judge Rosa Aragonés said this act was not isolated and Ren had engaged in other “cruel behaviors” towards “easy or vulnerable victims.” One hopes that such exploitation and disrespect will not take place in the name of fun and that social media users recognize their boundaries.