[article id="1695448"]Editor's note: Half an hour after this story was published, Justin Bieber revealed his new video for "Beauty and a Beat" and that the threatening twitter account was indeed a prank. A rep. from the singer's label maintains that Beiber's laptop and camera were indeed stolen . Click here to see his brand-new video.[/article]

You don't have to be President Obama to know that it's never a good idea to negotiate with a terrorist. So, Justin Bieber fans may have been a bit surprised on Thursday to see the singer engaging in a bizarre back-and-forth Twitter feud with the someone going by @gexwy, who claimed to be the person who stole Bieber's laptop and camera at a show in Tacoma earlier this week.

MTV has reached out to Bieber's publicist and to Tacoma police to see if they have any response to the alleged theft. A spokesperson for Justin declined to comment on Wednesday and again on Friday about the incident and News was not able to reach a public information officer for the Tacoma Police Department at press time to confirm whether an investigation had been launched into the alleged theft.

A label spokesperson told MTV News, "it's an unfortunate situation when personal property is stolen. There will be no further comment."

Bieber's camp has claimed that the laptop had some personal footage on it and @gexwy released two allegedly pilfered clips as proof of the purported heist. In one, a noticeably young Bieber is seen backstage lifting a curtain as his female fans scream his name on the other side of a window and in the second the singer is shown goofing off backstage and pulling a prank on one of his crew by dumping protein powder on his head.

In addition, Perez Hilton posted a five-second video also allegedly taken from the stolen personal stash, which finds a black tank top-wearing Bieber frolicking in a pool with a bunch of friends as he films himself.

Both Nicki Minaj and Bieber tweeted on Thursday about a big "surprise" coming at noon on Friday. And according to the Oh No They Didn't blog, VEVO posted a (currently set to private) still from the as-yet-unreleased Bieber/Minaj video for "Beauty and a Beat" in which a black tank top-wearing Justin is, yes, frolicking in a pool with Nicki while seemingly filming himself. That coincidence has led a number of outlets to question whether the stolen laptop story is an elaborate promotional hoax.

Bieber knows a bit about pulling complicated pranks from his days on MTV's "Punk'd," but we'll have to wait until noon to find out if this is a true crime, or just an elaborate online ruse to promote his new music video.