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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

Deutsche Presse-AgenturCrime & justice

Das Foto von einem Polizisten mit umstrittenen Uniform-Aufnähern auf einem Neonazi-Festival im sächsischen Ostritz hat im Juni 2019 für Aufregung gesorgt. Auf Facebook wird mit einer Kombination aus zwei Fotos suggeriert, er sei im Anschluss an den Polizeieinsatz auf dem Musikfestival aufgetreten. Die Kombination trägt die Überschrift «Skandalöse Doppelbelastung in Ostritz: Wenn du nach dem Dienst direkt auf die Showbühne musst»

Publisher’s rating: Die Fotos zeigen zwei unterschiedliche Männer.

The claim concerns a Facebook image combining a photograph of a police officer at the June 2019 music festival in Ostritz with a photograph of a performer. Its headline suggests the officer went onstage after the police operation. The review identifies the key issue as whether the two photographs show the same man, rather than whether the officer’s uniform patches were controversial. [Source: S1]

Deutsche Presse-AgenturCrime & justice

«Vertuscht» heißt es in der Überschrift: Ein Artikel auf der Online-Plattform «wochenblick.at» unterstellt deutschen Medien, ihre Berichte über den Rückgang der Straftaten in Deutschland im Jahr 2018 seien «gewaltige statistische Lügen». Dabei suggeriert die Website anhand der Zahlen zu Straftaten von Zuwanderern, die Kriminalität in Deutschland habe zugenommen.

Publisher’s rating: Die polizeiliche Sonderauswertung zur Kriminalität im Kontext von Zuwanderung sagt nichts über die Entwicklung der Gesamtkriminalität in Deutschland aus. Zudem zieht der «wochenblick.at»-Artikel aus den BKA-Informationen falsche Schlüsse.

The dispute concerns a wochenblick.at article that called German media reports of falling crime in 2018 “statistical lies” and used figures about crimes involving migrants to suggest crime had increased. The dpa review compares that argument with two distinct BKA products: the nationwide Police Crime Statistics (PKS) and a separate report on crime in the context of migration (BLB). It says the BLB figures cited by the website do not establish a trend in total crime. The PKS recorded about 5.4 million offences in 2018, excluding violations of immigration law, the lowest number since 1992. The figures were not uniformly down: some offence categories rose while others, including burglary and street crime, fell. The review’s account is that the overall total was lower than the previous year. It also notes that the website focused on two particular victim–suspect combinations rather than the full range of relationships recorded, and did not sufficiently distinguish migrants from the broader category of foreign nationals. The review examines the website’s claim that murders of Germans by migrants rose 105 percent. The BKA figure it discusses was 230 German victims in murder, manslaughter and killing on request cases involving at least one suspected migrant; the BKA’s reported increase was not a count of 230 people murdered by migrants. Most of those victims were associated with attempted offences, and 102 were victims of completed offences. The review cautions that even this latter number does not mean 102 people were murdered: the BLB counts everyone affected by a completed offence, including people injured when another person was killed. It attributes the increase in German victims recorded in 2018 to the delayed statistical recording of the 19 December 2016 attack at Berlin’s Breitscheidplatz.

Fact CrescendoCrime & justice

Claim: TN Minister Son fights with police while being drunk in Chennai

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The viral video showed a man allegedly driving drunk, causing a crash and arguing with police in Chennai. The post identified him as the son of Tamil Nadu law minister C. V. Shanmugam. Fact Crescendo’s review says the incident occurred in Neelankarai in the early hours of June 25, 2019, and reports that its search found news accounts identifying the man as Naveen, a fruit exporter from Vilankudi in Madurai district who worked in Thiruvanmiyur. The review therefore rejected the post’s identification of him as the minister’s son. The review also reports that Shanmugam filed a complaint with the Chennai police commissioner about the rumor. It says the minister’s complaint identified his son as Jayasimman and stated that he had only just completed Class 12. On the evidence described in the review, the video concerned a real incident, but the claim that the man involved was Shanmugam’s son was false.

The QuintCrime & justice

Were Hindu Brother-Sister Thrashed in UP for Resisting Rape?

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a viral video showing a bleeding man and woman. Posts identified them as Hindu siblings and alleged that Muslim men beat them after trying to rape the woman and being stopped by her brother. The Quint’s account says the incident did occur in Itaunja, Lucknow, but that the communal framing was false. It reports that Lucknow police described the two sides as belonging to the same community. [S1]