In the mid-2010s, somewhat of a ‘generational divide’ occurred in the entertainment space: many in the older demographic were puzzled by the fact that some of the new generation’s biggest celebrities were so-called ‘streamers’, whose main type of content was typically recording themselves playing popular video games. Little did they know that while they may appear as lazy or low-effort, they were actually quite a wholesome type of content creators compared to a new trend.
So-called ‘IRL streamers’ are hardly the biggest stars on social media these days. However, they certainly have enough of an audience to be worth it for them to take their cell phones and livestream themselves roaming the streets. Some of them, to garner more attention, took it upon themselves to be as annoying, disrespectful, and downright abusive to strangers as possible. This subset of streamers has been dubbed ‘nuisance streamers’.
And there is no better (or, rather, more notorious) example of them than Johnny Somali.
Somali, whose real name is Ramsey Khalid Ismael, was also among the early adopters who realized that this type of content is best advised to be done outside of the United States, where a large proportion of the populace is armed and most states have strong self-defence laws. Case in point, in September 2023, a delivery driver was acquitted by a jury for shooting 21-year-old YouTube ‘prankster’ Tanner Cook in the gut after harassing him at a mall for content in Sterling, Virginia.
Johnny Somali understood that the most fertile ground for his antics is East Asian countries, where the culture is polite, people are generally taught to be agreeable and non-confrontational with strangers, and there are a lot more lax self-defence laws in place.
Japan was his first hunting ground, where, among other things, he routinely taunted strangers with the atomic bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima during World War II, played the tsunami warning siren on his phone, and went to a construction site without authorization to harass the workers.
This resulted in his being convicted of obstruction of business, serving three months in jail, paying a ¥200,000 ($1,400) fine, and being deported and banned from the country after a public apology in court.
A brief stint in Israel made Somali quickly realize that it is not an optimal place for nuisance streaming, so he went back East, to South Korea. However, it is that decision that most likely led to his demise.
Is Johnny Somali Going to Jail in South Korea?
Almost certainly, yes. He is currently being charged with two counts of obstruction of business, two counts of violating the Minor Crimes Act, and—the most serious of them all—one count of producing a sexual AI video of a female South Korean streamer without her consent.
He is banned from leaving the country until all of his cases are resolved and the subsequent sentences are served.
Ismael already pleaded guilty to three of those charges, one obstruction of business and two minor crimes, at his first court hearing in March. His next court date is 9 April, where he will have the chance to plead to his second obstruction of business charge, which, for some reason, both he and his public defender were unaware of at the first hearing.
Somali really provoked the ire of the Korean public back in October 2024, when he started filming content around the so-called comfort women statues, statues of women scattered around the capital city of Seoul that commemorate victims of sexual assault during the Japanese occupation. Somali thought it would be funny to kiss them, dance around them shirtless, and rub baby oil on them.
To add insult to injury, Somali also routinely praises both Imperial Japan and North Korea in his videos to anger the locals. As a result, Korean people gathered online to place a bounty on Somali, which would be paid out to anyone who manages to punch him during his livestream. This has happened on multiple occasions.
Interestingly, however, Somali is not being charged in connection with his antics with the comfort women statues at all. Instead, his criminal charges are for drinking alcohol and cussing out an elderly employee at a 7/11 convenience store (obstruction of business), and harassing strangers with a rotting fish in a bag and playing loud music and suggestively dancing on the Seoul metro (two Minor Crimes Act violations). The exact details of the second obstruction of business charge will be revealed at the 9 April hearing.
Despite his serious charges, Somali seems not to be able to grasp the gravity of his situation. As soon as he found a platform that was willing to have him on, the fledgling new live streaming site Parti.com (all major sites have already banned him), he took the opportunity to broadcast himself running around in his underwear and yelling in the streets of Seoul, which resulted in his arrest. However, the Seoul Metropolitan Police let him go free without a charge the next day that time.
On the night before his first trial date, he went live on Parti.com and got extremely drunk. As a result, he was over an hour late to his appearance in court.
In his live broadcasts, Somali routinely professes his confidence that he will not face jail time or any serious consequences as he is an American citizen. He always wears President Trump’s signature red Make America Great Again hat (including at his court appearance, despite being instructed to take it off, by the way…) in order to appeal to the US government for help.
However, a Bangkok, Thailand-based American expat lawyer going by the online moniker Legal Mindset, who has been excessively covering the Johnny Somali case, claims he has talked to sources within the US State Department and they will not be coming to Ismael’s rescue.
What really hurts Somali’s chances for a light sentence is that he is not alone. There are currently multiple American streamers broadcasting similar content from South Korea and Japan—his was just the most extreme example. In another recent high-profile case, Russian American streamer Vitaly Zdorovetskiy has been detained by authorities in the Philippines for similar behaviour and is currently awaiting deportation at a detention centre.
These countries will have to stand their ground and make examples of a few high-profile offenders or risk their people becoming simple props for American pranksters to prey upon for content.
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