French influencer, 27, jailed 6 months for prank where he jabs people with fake syringe

French influencer Amine Mojito, whose real name is Ilan M., has been sentenced to six months in prison after a viral prank video showing him pretending to inject strangers with a syringe sparked widespread public outrage in France, reported Libération.

The Paris Criminal Court handed down the ruling on Oct. 3 2025, convicting the 27-year-old of “violence with a weapon that did not result in incapacity for work”.

The syringe prank

🚨 🇫🇷 ALERTE INFO : Amine Mojito, dit « le piqueur fou » qui s’en prenait aux passants avec une seringue vide, condamné à six mois de prison ferme. pic.twitter.com/vVVl0JpNDG

— Wolf 🐺 (@PsyGuy007) October 3, 2025

Mojito, who has over 130,000 Instagram followers, filmed himself roaming the streets of Paris ahead of the Fête de la Musique (World Music Day) celebrations in June.

In the video, which was captioned “Mojito le piqueur fou” (“the mad stinger”), he was seen sneaking up on strangers and pretending to inject them with a syringe while recording their startled reactions.

Although the syringe turned out to be empty and capped, the videos provoked sharp backlash from French citizens at a time when France was already gripped by panic over reports of needle-spiking incidents at student parties and festivals.

Dozens of women in France claimed they had been injected with foreign substances in public against their will, according to a report done by Libération in June 2025.

Court ruling

The prosecution initially sought a harsher 15-month sentence under electronic monitoring, with five months suspended, reported the New York Post.

Prosecutors argued that Mojito’s videos, “intentionally or not,” contributed to the atmosphere of fear surrounding these events and that the influencer had worsened public anxiety for the sake of online attention.

The Paris Criminal Court ultimately sentenced him to 12 months in prison, half of which was suspended.

He was also fined €1,500 (s$2,260) and banned from owning or carrying any weapons for three years.

During the trial, Mojito told the court that he had been “in (his) own world” and unaware of the sensitivity of the issue.

He said he was trying to revive his social media career and promote a fitness program after a brief stint as an influencer when he was a teenager.

“I had the very bad idea of doing these pranks by imitating what I saw on the internet, in Spain and in Portugal.”

“I didn’t think it could hurt people — I thought about myself, not others,” he added.

His lawyer, Marie Claret de Fleurieu, had asked for clemency from the court.

She said the sentence that was eventually handed to her client “brings the debates back into more proportion after the initial media frenzy” and “restores a little balance between the preservation of public order and that of the fundamental rights of my client”, according to Libération.

Public reaction

Many netizens, however, thought that 6 months was too lenient and expressed outrage.

Most noted that this was not just a “harmless” prank and that it wasn’t funny at all.

“The gesture is revolting, even with an empty syringe. The risk of spreading this kind of video is that crazies will imitate it with harmful substances,” one said, according to The New York Post.

“Even if it was a ‘prank’, I imagine that some of the people who were tricked must have lived in terror at the thought of having been actually stabbed and contaminated by something,” another user wrote.

Other convictions

Mojito had reportedly already spent nearly two months in pre-trial detention, held in isolation at Fleury-Mérogis prison which is Europe’s largest correctional facility.

According to Entrevue and other French media, he also has prior convictions for aggravated assault and sexual assault.

Unless he files for an appeal, Mojito is expected to serve his six-month sentence.

Top images via PsyGuy007/X, amine_mojitonew/Instagram