What looked like two would-be murderers trying to destroy the evidence at a Hazleton car wash turned out to be a prank that Police Chief Frank DeAndrea hopes doesn't happen again.

DeAndrea said Shayne Balliet, 26, of Freeland, and Cody Chippi, 19, of North Locust Street, Hazleton, should be thankful they got off with only a citation for disorderly conduct after smearing what looked like blood on their car, placing what looked like a body sticking out of the trunk and going to the car wash at 15th and Roosevelt streets around 5 p.m. Tuesday."Somewhere in their infinite wisdom, these two guys got the idea it would be a great prank to put barbecue sauce and ketchup on the hood of their white car, place a mannequin in a garbage bag with the legs sticking out of the bag in the trunk of the car and going to the car wash to make it look like they were cleaning blood off the car," DeAndrea said."We got several 911 calls from individuals and business people and went racing to the scene," the chief said. "When we got there, we saw the 'blood' on the hood, and said, 'Do we smell barbecue sauce?' Then we saw the mannequin."DeAndrea said the two men tried to explain their actions."They said they didn't mean to upset anybody," DeAndrea said. "They said they wanted to film it as a prank for YouTube. The (Luzerne County) District Attorney's Office did not want to prosecute them for reckless endangerment, so they got off with disorderly conduct."A video of the prank is on YouTube. The video depicts a man, presumably Balliet his name was in the lower left corner of the video narrating what they were doing. The video shows when the men got out of the car at the car wash they were wearing masks as one held the mannequin over his shoulder."We didn't intend to cause any panic with any people, or especially get the cops involved," Balliet said in the video. "It wound up that we only got one shot and it wasn't even a funny one, and then a ton of cops pulled up."DeAndrea said he hopes anyone else who has ever considered doing something similar will be discouraged by the incident."People who thought it was real were scared," the chief said. "The police believed it was real. When police get a call like that, everyone goes racing to the scene with lights and sirens as did the Hazleton and West Hazleton police departments because you have perhaps minutes before that car disappears. Suppose something happened? Maybe a driver who doesn't react well to lights and sirens cuts someone off, or hits a pedestrian."DeAndrea said the incident could have been more vigorously prosecuted by the district attorney."If something like this happens again, I'm confident the District Attorney's Office will not be as generous the next time and will prosecute for reckless endangerment," the chief said. "I'm hoping people use this as a learning experience."At the end of the video, Balliet said the pranks are not over."We are definitely not going to be giving up the prank videos anytime soon," he said. "This is a hint of what is to come. We're going to step it up. We're going to try not to get arrested or fined, but it comes with the territory. There's all kinds of fun stuff coming in the future."On the video, a police officer said it was a "$450 prank," alluding to the fine the men face on the disorderly conduct charge.Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC