Parents lose custody of their children after cruel YouTube ‘pranks’

The videos, which were posted by 'DaddyOFive', show the children's father and stepmother playing "pranks" on the kids - mostly 9-year-old Cody - where they accuse them of doing something wrong and then inflict punishment. 

One clip shows the father pushing Cody into a bookshelf before cutting to show him crying on his bed with blood on the pillow.

With titles such as "Dad punches kid in the face" and "psycho clown attacks family" depicting scenes of intense screaming, swearing and at times, violence towards the kids, it didn't take long for people to rally together for child services to get involved, saying what was shown in the clips was child abuse. 

Now emergency custody of two of the children (who were the victims in most of the clips) has been given to their biological mother, Rose Hall, who says in an update video that they are "doing good" and are "getting back to their playful selves."

'DaddyOFive', Mike Martin, and his partner, Heather, have now issued a public apology and enlisted the services of a crisis management agency to handle the backlash. 

The video below, posted by another popular YouTuber, highlights some of the most intense scenes the Martin's subjected their children to and has been viewed over four million times. 

Warning: These scenes may be upsetting.