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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Crime & justice fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about crime & justice. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

6,833 published reviews in this topic

Soch Fact CheckCrime & justice

No girls were born in the past three months across 132 villages in India due to female infanticide.

Publisher’s rating: Misleading

The claim refers to a statistic about 132 villages in Uttarakhand: reports said no girls were born there over a three-month period. Soch Fact Check traced the story to reports published on 23 July 2019, rather than a recent event. Its review describes a social-media post from 31 August 2023 that reused a screenshot of a news bulletin and added the claim that the babies had been killed. The evidence in the review supports the existence of the reported birth statistic, but does not establish that female infanticide caused it. The review says the villages had been flagged as “red zones” and that officials ordered a probe. It also cites journalist Neha Poonia’s account that 16 villages had recorded no girls born in six months. That is evidence of reported figures and official concern—not proof that girls were killed or that infanticide was the cause. To check the screenshot’s provenance, the review says it compared it with CNA’s YouTube livestream. It also points to the screenshot’s news crawler about Theresa May’s final speech as a timing clue: the crawler referred to an event on 24 July 2019, the day after the Al Jazeera report. Together with the identified 2019 reporting, these details show why recirculating the story in 2023 without its age was misleading.

Factcrescendo Sri LankaCrime & justice

The Woman Accompanying Dhanushka To Court Is His Lawyer!

Publisher’s rating: False

The claim concerns a woman seen accompanying Dhanushka Gunathilaka during his trial in Sydney, and whether she was his lawyer. The review says social-media posts speculated that she was his legal representative, then checked who was representing him. It reports that Senior Counsel Murugan Thangaraj was the lead defense lawyer, a fact the article says was confirmed by Sri Lanka Cricket media manager Prasanna Rodrigu. It also identifies Gabrielle Steedman as the state prosecutor, distinguishing the prosecution from Gunathilaka’s defense team. The review says Australian news coverage speculated that the woman holding hands with Gunathilaka might be his girlfriend. It also cites a Facebook page that described her as having no legal background and being neither a law student nor a practicing lawyer. The article therefore identifies no basis for treating her as his lawyer; it reports that she was believed to be his current girlfriend, while his legal representation was handled by Thangaraj. The court context is specific: the review says the case followed allegations arising from the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia, and that the trial concluded on September 21 in Sydney’s Downing Center District Court. It reports that Judge Sarah Huggett acquitted Gunathilaka on September 28. These details situate the images and the claim, but the review’s evidence about the woman’s role rests on its identification of the defense counsel and the cited reporting about her, rather than on a description of a direct interview with her.

dpaCrime & justice

Een moslimchauffeur werd in Oezbekistan aangehouden terwijl hij op verdachte wijze kinderen vervoerde. Hij gaf toe dat de kinderen verkocht zouden worden voor seksuele handel en orgaanroof.

Publisher’s rating: Er is geen sprake van kinderhandel of orgaanroof. De auto werd bestuurd door een lerares van een lokale basisschool in het district Gijduvan. Ze werd aangehouden door de politie en verklaarde dat dit de eerste keer was dat ze zoveel kinderen van school tegelijk vervoerde. Welke straf de vrouw boven het hoofd hangt voor het schenden van de verkeersregels is nog onbekend.