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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

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: Adirampattinam muslim woman killed for refusing to protest against CAA

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: False

The review investigates a viral post alleging that a Muslim woman in Adirampattinam was beaten to death for refusing to draw a kolam in opposition to the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). It describes the post, attributed to V. Kannan and dated December 30, 2019, as containing videos of a woman being questioned and of Muslim women being taken away by police. In one video, a woman is heard saying that she is the sister of the murdered woman’s husband and that the killing happened unknowingly. The post presented this material as evidence of a politically motivated killing. The review says it searched for other news coverage of the incident but found none. It also found a report on a website it characterized as right-wing, which attributed the incident to a dispute between a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. The reviewer reasoned that the site’s failure to frame the incident as anti-CAA violence weighed against the viral post’s account. That reasoning is presented as part of the review’s investigation, rather than as independent confirmation. The central evidence reported is a call to Adirampattinam police. An officer told the reviewer that the killing arose from a family dispute and had no connection to the kolam protest or recent political events; the officer said the investigation indicated that women related to the victim as her mother-in-law and sister-in-law beat the daughter-in-law to death. The review concludes that the viral post falsely connected a family-related killing to opposition to the CAA. The supplied excerpt does not provide the officer’s name or an independently available police record.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: Nellai Kannan absconding

Publisher’s rating: Fact Crescendo Rating: Partly False

The claim concerned Facebook posts saying that Nellai Kannan, a Tamil public speaker, had gone into hiding after complaints were filed over remarks about Amit Shah and Narendra Modi. The review says a case had been registered against him under three sections and that BJP and AIADMK members had called for his arrest. Those circumstances did not, by themselves, establish that he was absconding. The article identifies the Facebook account “Students Against Corruption 2.0” as one account sharing the claim and notes that similar posts circulated during the preceding 24 hours. The review’s account of the events on December 31 points instead to Kannan being at home and then taken for medical care. It says he had previously undergone heart surgery and was unwell; that afternoon, an ambulance took him to a private hospital on Tirunelveli North Bypass Road, where the hospital reportedly refused to admit him. After BJP members gathered there, he was taken to another hospital. The article reports that police said they would decide about arrest after learning more about his health. On that evidence, the review concludes that Kannan had not gone into hiding: it says he remained at his home from the controversial speech until the afternoon of December 31, when he was taken for treatment. It also distinguishes the true element of the posts—the case against him—from their unsupported claim that he was absconding. The supplied excerpt describes this sequence but does not name the hospitals or provide independent records or named interviewees.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: UP man attacking a muslim in front of Police

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a photograph circulated as showing a right-wing supporter pulling a Muslim man’s beard in front of Uttar Pradesh police. The review describes the image and the accompanying social-media wording, which presented the incident as an assault in Uttar Pradesh. It notes that the post did not say when the photograph was taken. The review questioned the location partly because the police officer in the image wore a white uniform. It says that, in India, police wear white uniforms only in West Bengal and Puducherry. The publisher then says it ran a reverse-image search and found reports placing the photograph in Bangladesh, rather than Uttar Pradesh. The review traces the image to a protest in Dhaka on February 13, 2013. It reports that material found during the search described a young man affiliated with Bangladesh’s ruling party attacking protesters alongside police. The investigation also found related photographs showing the attack and press photographers taking pictures, and a post by the Bangladeshi newspaper Daily Naya Diganta identifying the event as taking place in Dhaka. On that evidence, the review concluded that the image did not depict the claimed Uttar Pradesh incident and that the attacker was not a Hindu right-wing supporter. Instead, it identified the image as showing a Bangladesh protest and an alleged ruling-party activist attacking protesters. The supplied excerpt reports the publisher’s search findings; it does not include links to the underlying image-search results or the original photograph’s full provenance.

NewtralCrime & justice

En Francia hay «vagones sólo para mujeres debido a agresiones sexuales cometidas por inmigrantes»

Publisher’s rating: Falso

The claim concerned a social-media video showing security agents stopping men from entering train cars occupied only by women. The review identifies the footage as having been filmed at Gare du Nord in Paris during the general strike that began on December 5, 2019. It says the temporary arrangement was intended to protect people at greater risk in overcrowded conditions—not to address sexual assaults by immigrants. To check the video’s setting, the review says it used reverse image searches of frames and found a local Le Parisien article showing the same footage. According to the review, SNCF said it had issued no such instruction and that there were no cars reserved for women on the RER B or other SNCF transport. The company said staff made operational decisions to protect the public. SNCF communications director Agnès Ogier described the exceptional conditions as very high passenger numbers and limited trains, and said the measure was for people more exposed to crowd movements, including disabled people, pregnant women and older people. The review also reports that Secretary of State Marlène Schiappa said no train car was forbidden to men.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: Police beating Jamia Millia Islamia student for Anti CAA protest

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The review examined a Facebook video circulated with the claim that police had beaten a Jamia Millia Islamia student taking part in protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). It says the video was being shared as a current incident amid protests against the CAA and a proposed National Register of Citizens, with Jamia students playing a prominent role in demonstrations in Delhi. The review’s conclusion is that the footage did not show the claimed current event. To check the video’s provenance, the investigators extracted a frame and performed a reverse-image search. They report that this led them to a 2014 incident, not the anti-CAA protests. The review identifies the footage as a video released by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), presenting it as an example of Delhi police treatment of ordinary people. It further reports that the three police officers seen beating the young man were suspended at the time. The distinction is central to the claim: the footage depicted a police beating, but the review says it was old footage recirculated with a misleading connection to the Jamia student protests. Its conclusion concerns that attribution of the video, rather than whether protests against the CAA took place.

The QuintCrime & justice

Cop slapped NRC protester

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a video circulated as showing a Delhi police officer slapping a protester during the nationwide protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Register of Citizens. The Quint’s investigation says the footage itself was not manipulated, but that it was being presented with the wrong event and date: “The video has not been manipulated in anyway, but the claim with which it is being shared is false.” To identify the footage, the review notes that the circulating clip carried NDTV’s channel logo and says it searched online using the keywords “female protester slapped Delhi police NDTV.” That search led to an NDTV report carrying the same video and describing the incident. The review identifies the officer as Assistant Commissioner of Police Bani Singh Ahlawat and places the event in 2013, outside Swami Dayanand Hospital in Delhi. It reports that a protester was slapped there while a five-year-old rape survivor was being treated. The review’s account therefore distinguishes the clip’s authenticity from the claim about its context: it shows a real slapping incident, but not one from the ongoing CAA/NRC protests. It also says that Ahlawat was suspended, citing the NDTV report, and that Aam Aadmi Party workers had clashed with police posted at the hospital. These details place the footage in the earlier hospital incident rather than the protests named in the viral claim.

FACTLYCrime & justice

A woman imprisoned for protesting against NRC is breastfeeding her baby at a detention centre in Banaras (Varanasi).

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns a circulating image said to show a woman imprisoned for protesting against the National Register of Citizens (NRC), breastfeeding her baby at a detention centre in Banaras (Varanasi). FACTLY investigated the image’s history rather than independently verifying the woman’s identity or the location shown.

台灣事實查核中心Crime & justice

網傳「民進黨已經通過了毒品條例了，校園內可以擁有5克的毒品，才被視同販毒。台灣除了是(同性戀島)(愛滋病島)現在又增加了一個(毒品島)了」，經查：12月17日立法院三讀通過《毒品危害防制條例》部分條文修正草案，持有第三級、第四級毒品從20公克降為5公克以上，即處以刑罰。此項修法是把處罰標準加重，而非放寬。根據毒品危害防制條例規定，有「販賣」毒品意圖就處以刑罰。傳言提及「校園可以擁有5克毒品，才被視同販毒」，為錯誤訊息。凡「持有」、「施用」第三級或第四級毒品者，即使未達入刑標準，仍會處以罰鍰與毒品危害講習。傳言提及「校園零容忍，被封殺」，並不符合事實。此傳言為「錯誤」訊息。

Publisher’s rating: 錯誤

FACTLYCrime & justice

UP government sent a notice of Rs 1,50,000 to a man for pelting stones.

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a specific photo: posts said the man pictured had received a Rs 1,50,000 notice from the Uttar Pradesh government for pelting stones. The review distinguishes that image from the then-recent protests in Uttar Pradesh, which it describes as protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act. It notes that the Uttar Pradesh chief minister had said protesters who destroyed public property could have their assets seized, but that statement does not establish that the man pictured received the claimed notice. S1 states: “The photo in the post has nothing to do with the recent protests in Uttar Pradesh.” To investigate the photo’s provenance, the review says it used Google reverse image search and found an older tweet containing the image. The tweet was dated January 8, 2016, and its user described the photo as related to the Malda riots in West Bengal. S1 reports: “The tweet was made on January 8, 2016, and the user has written that the photo is that of ‘Malda riots’ in West Bengal.” The review also cites an India Today article dated January 6, 2016, reporting riots in Malda, West Bengal, in opposition to a speech by All India Hindu Mahasabha leader Kamalesh Tiwari. However, it does not claim to establish the photo’s precise circumstances: “While the exact context of the photo cannot be ascertained with the available information.” Its finding is narrower: the image was already circulating years earlier and was not evidence that the pictured man received a notice in connection with the recent Uttar Pradesh protests. S1 concludes: “the image in the post is an old one and has nothing to do with the recent protests in Uttar Pradesh.”

FACTLYCrime & justice

A Woman protester being slapped by Delhi police during the protests against the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

Publisher’s rating: MISLEADING

The claim concerns a video presented as showing a woman protester being slapped by Delhi police during demonstrations against the National Register of Citizens. FACTLY reports that the footage does show a woman being slapped by police, but identifies the protest as a different event: demonstrations in 2013 concerning the rape of a five-year-old girl known as “Gudiya.” The key distinction is the reason and time of the protest, not whether the video depicts a slap. (S1) To check the video’s provenance, the review notes that it carries an NDTV watermark. FACTLY says it searched YouTube using the terms “Delhi police slapped woman protestor ndtv” and found the same video. That video was timestamped April 19, 2013, and its description placed the incident amid protests at a Delhi hospital where the child rape survivor was being treated. (S1) The review also cites an India Today article dated April 20, 2013, reporting demonstrations at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi over the rape of Gudiya in East Delhi’s Gandhi Nagar. Taken together, the matching footage, its 2013 timestamp and description, and the reporting about the protests support the conclusion that the video is from that earlier demonstration—not the anti-NRC protests identified in the claim. The supplied excerpt does not describe any further verification beyond these checks. (S1)