The Sam Pepper story gets even uglier: The YouTube "pranker" now faces accusations of sexual assault

The Sam Pepper situation just gets uglier and uglier. As YouTube sex educator Laci Green explains in the video above, Pepper, under fire for “prank” videos on YouTube that appear to show him sexually harassing numerous young women, is now facing serious accusations of sexual misconduct from numerous women – including, in one case, violent rape.

For those who haven’t been following the story as it’s developed over the past week: Sam Pepper is a former Big Brother UK cast member and YouTube personality best known for a series of unfunny “prank” videos which have often featured him sexually harassing women in various creepy ways.

Earlier this week, Pepper posted a video titled “Fake Hand Ass Pinch Prank,” that featured him grabbing the asses of various women he encountered on the street with his real hand – the fake hand (arm, actually) was a bit of a misdirect to make it look as though it wasn’t really him doing the pinching.

This apparently was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. After a groundswell of complaints about the blatant sexual harassment in the video, YouTube took it down.

Pepper responded with a second video, in which a woman went around pinching men’s asses, and then a third, in which he claimed, bizarrely, that the whole thing had been staged with actors in an attempt to bring public attention to the issue of … sexual harassment against men.

This claim reeks of bullshit. Over the course of his less-than-illustrious career Pepper has put forth numerous videos that feature similar sexual harassment of women — oh, sorry, “pranks.” If you go through his YouTube uploads, you’ll find videos in which he literally handcuffs himself to unsuspecting and clearly uncomfortable women, promising to release them if they kiss him. In other videos he forces kisses on other unsuspecting women; in yet another he and an accomplice literally lasso women and claim them for their own.

Are all these videos fake, too? Are they all part of his grand plan to bring light to sexual harassment against … men?

Or are they what they appear to be, videos in which Pepper harasses women and calls it pranking?

And is his big “reveal” video a sincere attempt to bring attention to sexual harassment of men?

Or is it a desperate attempt to spin his way out of a scandal of his own making and rescue his sleazy but extremely lucrative YouTube career, which is now in danger of imploding?

The answers to these questions seem pretty obvious to me.

And now, as Laci Green points out in the video above, women are coming forward to tell of their own (alleged) encounters with Pepper. Their stories paint a picture of Pepper as an overentitled sexual predator who uses his internet fame – he’s got 2.4 million YouTube followers – as a tool to exploit and abuse young women – and teenage girls.

Below, I’ve posted a video from the woman who says Pepper raped her. It’s harrowing to watch — and a big TRIGGER WARNING for graphic description of the alleged rape. She has also provided a written account here, including screenshots of texts she allegedly exchanged with Pepper.

I say “alleged” because the case has not been proven in court. But I believe her.

You can find another video from an accuser here. Laci Green’s Open Letter to Pepper — written before the latest round of accusations — is here. Green has been getting threatening emails that seem to be coming from Pepper himself; Pepper, on Twitter, claims that his email address is being “spoofed” and that the threats aren’t coming from him.  Buzzfeed, meanwhile, reports that Pepper is also being accused of soliciting nude photos from an underage girl. Another girl claims that Pepper sexually assaulted her when she was 15.

Follow Green on Twitter for updates as this develops. I suspect this is going to get even uglier still.