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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.

6,854 published reviews in this topic

Satya Priya BNCrime & justice

Video show France police shooting Muslim immigrants

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim attached a video to a supposed clash in France, alleging that Muslim immigrants had rioted over Sharia law and that French police shot them. The review says the video circulated on Facebook and Twitter and was shared amid protests against India’s Citizenship Amendment Act, with some users comparing Indian police to police in other countries. The review’s conclusion is that the footage was not from France and did not show the people or incident claimed. [S1]

FACTLYCrime & justice

Mangalore Police released the photo of a Muslim suspected in the Mangalore Airport Bomb Case.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The review says the photo circulating with the claim was not released by Mangalore Police. It identifies the accused in the airport bomb case as Adithya Rao, not “Mulla Mosin,” the name associated with the claim. The review points readers to the police-released photos and information about the accused as the relevant comparison, but the supplied excerpt does not describe a more detailed comparison method or provide those linked materials.

FACTLYCrime & justice

The man dressed in RSS uniform in the photo is Adithya Rao, the accused in the Mangalore Airport Bomb Case.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a photo circulating on social media that purported to show Adithya Rao, who had surrendered to Bengaluru Police in connection with the explosive device planted outside Mangalore Airport. The review says the man in the RSS uniform is not Rao, but Sandeep Lobo. To assess the identification, the review compared the faces in the images and reported that they were not the same. It also traced a similar RSS-uniform photo to a Facebook profile under Lobo’s name. According to the review, Lobo denied being Rao and posted photos of a complaint he had filed about the fake social-media posts. The review further says that a separate photo showing Lobo with MP Tejasvi Surya was also misrepresented as depicting Rao. These points address the identification in the claim: the review attributes the pictured man to Lobo, not to the airport-bombing accused. It does not describe the photo’s original capture or independently establish its full provenance.

FACTLYCrime & justice

Mullah being beaten for trying to rape a 5-year-old girl in Ambala, Haryana.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video said to show a Mullah being beaten in Ambala, Haryana, while trying to rape a 5-year-old girl. FACTLY’s investigation identified the man in the video as Pavan Kumar, whom the review describes as Hindu, not Muslim. It also distinguishes the reason for the beating from the viral allegation: the man was beaten over sexual harassment, not while attempting to rape a girl. To check the video’s context, FACTLY reports finding the same footage in Dainik Bhaskar and ANI articles. Those accounts described the man as sexually harassing three girls on their way to school; ANI also reported that he behaved vulgarly and exposed himself. FACTLY says it contacted Sunita Daka, the SHO of the Women Police Station, who confirmed an arrest following a complaint of sexual harassment involving three girls—two aged 15 and one aged 6—and identified the accused as Pawan Kumar, not Muslim. The review’s evidence therefore contradicts both the viral claim’s identification of the man and its description of the alleged incident.

NewtralCrime & justice

El Estatuto de la Fiscalía fue renovado hace dos años

Publisher’s rating: Falso

Pedro Sánchez made the statement at a press conference on 14 January, after the first meeting of his new government’s Council of Ministers. Asked whether he would change how the Fiscal General del Estado is chosen or the length of the officeholder’s term, he said the Fiscalía statute had been renewed two years earlier and was not an outdated, nineteenth-century law. The review checks that assertion against the statute’s record of amendments, rather than relying on the statement alone. [S1: “Pedro Sánchez, compareció en rueda de prensa el 14 de enero tras la reunión del primer Consejo de Ministros del nuevo Ejecutivo.”; “Sánchez respondió: ‘El Estatuto de la Fiscalía fue renovado hace dos años, ¿no? No estamos hablando de algo decimonónico, sino que ha tenido reformas y la última ha sido muy reciente».”; “Para comprobar si esto es cierto, miramos el propio Estatuto Orgánico del Ministerio Fiscal, donde se recoge cada modificación desde su creación”] According to the review, the statute’s latest modification was in 2010, not two years before Sánchez’s statement. The change replaced its first additional provision with the fourth provision of Law 4/2010. The review says that provision addressed how members of the fiscal career acquire or lose that status, their replacement, and the legal regime for substitute prosecutors. [S1: “Allí vemos que la última modificación fue en 2010, y no hace dos años, como indicó el Presidente.”; “En esa modificación se sustituyó la disposición adicional primera por la cuarta de la Ley 4/2010, en la que se recoge cómo se adquiere y pierde la condición de miembro de la carrera fiscal, cómo se sustituye a estos miembros y qué régimen jurídico tienen los Fiscales sustitutos.”] The review also distinguishes the date of the statute’s latest amendment from the matters raised in the press-conference question: it says the 2010 change did not concern either the method for choosing the Fiscal General del Estado or the time that person could remain in office. It reports that the publisher asked the President’s press team about the statement but had not received a response when the article was written. [S1: “ni la última vez que esto pasó, en 2010, se tocó nada relacionado con la manera de elegir al Fiscal General del Estado o los tiempos que este podía estar en ese puesto, que es lo que le preguntaron a Sánchez.”; “Hemos preguntado al equipo de prensa del Presidente por esta declaración pero aún no hemos obtenido respuesta.”]

Deutsche Presse-AgenturCrime & justice

In mehreren Posts in sozialen Netzwerken wird behauptet, ein 8-jähriges Mädchen sei in Kleve (Nordrhein-Westfalen) entführt worden und werde nun gesucht. Angeblich könne man auf einer Webseite ein "Video von der Überwachung" sehen.

Publisher’s rating: Nutzer sollten keinesfalls auf den Link zu der vermeintlichen Entführung klicken. Es gibt keinen solchen Entführungsfall in Kleve. Die Links führen zu gefälschten Webseiten, auf denen den Nutzern möglicherweise Daten geklaut werden sollen.

NewtralCrime & justice

«Delgado pidió disculpas» (tras la polémica de Villarejo)

Publisher’s rating: Falso

The claim concerns Pablo Iglesias’s defense of Dolores Delgado’s appointment as attorney general. In an Antena 3 interview, Iglesias said Delgado had apologized after her connection to former police commissioner José Villarejo became controversial. The article distinguishes that assertion from Iglesias’s acknowledgment that he had previously made “a very harsh criticism” when calling for Delgado’s resignation as justice minister. The investigation describes Delgado’s public statements and the records it reviewed. After initially denying a relationship with Villarejo, she acknowledged in a Justice Ministry statement dated 24 September 2018 that she had encountered him three times alongside other police and judicial officials. In a later appearance before Congress, she said she had attended a meal with senior police officials, denied a professional relationship or friendship with Villarejo, and attributed the recordings’ release to his legal strategy. The article reports that neither this appearance nor her public statements included an apology for the meetings or for initially denying them. The article says Newtral asked Iglesias’s team for the source or reference behind his assertion, but received no response. It also notes a separate apology-related episode: after Delgado’s remarks about Fernando Grande-Marlaska were recorded, an LGBT organization called for her to apologize, while Grande-Marlaska said he had not been offended. The article’s account therefore does not substantiate an apology by Delgado for her Villarejo meetings or her initial denial; it presents Iglesias’s assertion as unsupported by the public statements and material examined.

FACTLYCrime & justice

Andhra Pradesh Police brutality on women farmers.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned three photographs circulated as evidence of Andhra Pradesh Police brutality against women farmers. The review places the claim in the setting of protests by farmers who had donated land for Amaravati after Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy proposed three capitals for the state on December 17, 2019. It says the photographs came from protests in different states, not the current protests in Andhra Pradesh. The review checked the images against earlier and other published appearances. For the first, it found the same photo in a November 2018 tweet and a YouTube video uploaded in May 2018. It could not establish that photo’s original context, but concluded that it was unrelated to the recent Andhra Pradesh protests. The second matched a Reuters photo-library description: Delhi Police attempting to detain a JNU student protesting a proposed fee hike; the photo was taken November 18, 2019. For the third image, the review found it in a December 12, 2019 Firstpost article and identified it as showing a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Bill in Guwahati, Assam. Taken together, these image matches and earlier appearances do not support presenting the three photographs as scenes of police brutality against women farmers in Andhra Pradesh. The review’s conclusion is limited to the provenance and relevance of these images; it does not establish the first image’s original context.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: ABVP leader caught for printing counterfeit currency in Mumbai

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: False

The review investigates a social-media post alleging that an ABVP leader was arrested in Mumbai for printing counterfeit currency. The post combined ABVP-related imagery with a photograph of police and stacks of ₹2,000 notes; its caption said an investigation was under way in Mumbai. The review identifies the image as showing a counterfeit-currency seizure, but finds that the incident was not in Mumbai and that the available reporting did not identify an ABVP leader among those arrested. To trace the image, the review says it used reverse-image search and found the same photograph and report in the Telugu newspaper Andhra Jyothi on November 2, 2019. Its account of that report placed the seizure in Khammam district, Telangana. The review then searched for English-language reports using “Khammam” and “counterfeit currency,” and says a Times of India report showed the same police officials and seized notes as the social-media post. The review further reports that an ANI item named Sheikh Madar among five people arrested, while the available reports did not establish a political affiliation for those arrested. It notes that reporting about the arrests appeared ten days later and that police named only a person with the Sheikh name. On this evidence, the review concludes that the post misrepresented a Telangana seizure as a Mumbai case and lacked support for its claim that an ABVP leader had been arrested for printing counterfeit notes.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: Social activist Sundharavalli arrested in prostitution case

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: False

The claim concerned a Facebook post featuring Sundharavalli’s photograph and a graphic styled like a Puthiya Thalaimurai news card. The post said she had been arrested in Chennai for forcing young women into prostitution. The review identified the post as shared by the Facebook account Sakthi Vel and said it was being widely circulated as true: “இதில், சுந்தரவள்ளி புகைப்படத்தை பகிர்ந்து, புதிய தலைமுறை நியூஸ் கார்டு போல உள்ள டெம்ப்ளேட்டில், ‘’இளம்பெண்களை கட்டாயப்படுத்தி விபச்சாரத்தில் ஈடுபட வைத்த தோழர் சுந்தரவள்ளி சென்னையில் கைது,’’ என்று எழுதியுள்ளனர். இதனை பலரும் உண்மை என நம்பி வைரலாக ஷேர் செய்து வருகின்றனர்.” The review reports that Sundharavalli had previously complained to police about rumors circulated against her, and describes this post as one such rumor. To check the apparent news-card source, the reviewers contacted Puthiya Thalaimurai’s online division. According to the review, the division said the card used its template but was a fake publication: “மேலும், இந்த ஃபேஸ்புக் பதிவில் புதியதலைமுறை நியூஸ் கார்டு டெம்ப்ளேட் பயன்படுத்தப்பட்டுள்ளதால், இது உண்மையா அல்லது பொய்யா என்ற சந்தேகத்தில், புதிய தலைமுறை ஆன்லைன் பிரிவை தொடர்புகொண்டு விசாரித்தோம். அவர்கள் இது தங்களது டெம்ப்ளேட்டை பயன்படுத்தி போலியாக வெளியிட்ட செய்தி எனக் கூறிவிட்டனர்.” On that basis, the review concluded that the Facebook post contained false information. Its stated finding is: “உரிய ஆதாரங்களின்படி, நாம் ஆய்வு செய்த ஃபேஸ்புக் பதிவில் தவறான தகவல் உள்ளதாக நிரூபிக்கப்பட்டுள்ளது.” The excerpt supports the conclusion that the purported news card was fabricated; it does not describe an independent check of police arrest records.