YouTuber faces charges for after-hours stunt videos at empty homes, businesses

CTV Ottawa: 24-hour challenge prankster Joanne Schnurr tells us why police are watching the 24 hour challenge guy and may lay charges.

Ottawa police are preparing trespassing charges against a man whose YouTube videos appear to show him sneaking into empty homes, stadiums and office buildings to spend the night.

Jason Ethier, 26, who goes by the name Jay Station on YouTube, has posted several videos of his antics at locations including RedBlacks Stadium and TD Place in Ottawa, where he claims to spend the night after everyone else has left.

But one of his latest "24 hour challenges," which involved sneaking into a vacant home, wound up capturing the attention of police. Video of the alleged incident shows Ethier entering the home through a window and walking around inside.

The video has since been debunked as a hoax perpetrated with the help of the tenants. Staff Sgt. Mike Haarbosch says police have "essentially since confirmed that the whole matter was staged."

However, while that incident will not lead to charges, he says Ethier is likely to face consequences related to his other videos. "I would suggest that he's already caught," Haarbosch said. "We're in the midst at this point of processing a number of charges, so he's going to have his day in court."

The Jay Station YouTube page is filled with videos of a man and his friends spending the night at various locations in Ottawa, where they are shown doing things like building toilet paper forts. Several of the videos have been viewed 1 million times.

Ethier told CTV Ottawa that he's "gotten rich" off the YouTube videos. "I was going to stop doing them, but I'm getting payments," he said.

Ethier posted a video acknowledging that police were looking into his actions back on Oct. 27, saying: "I can no longer do these 24-hour challenges because basically I'm risking my freedom to do that and that's something I'm not prepared to give up." He also claims that he did not steal, cause damage or break into any of the places he visited.

But, despite his "retirement" announcement, Ethier has continued to appear in videos on the Jay Station page. Nine more stunts have been posted since Oct. 27, including overnight the night at a pizza restaurant, a car mechanic’s shop and a Dairy Queen.

The Dairy Queen video appears to show several individuals in the restaurant after hours, where they can be seen drinking chocolate syrup, covering each other in sprinkles and putting their faces in ice cream cake.

With files from CTV Ottawa