The parents of the 19 children killed at Robb Elementary School, Uvalde, Texas, have spent months enduring not only the senseless deaths of their children, but new details of the bungled response by police during the massacre.
Officers have been criticized for waiting more than 70 minutes to confront the gunman, who also killed two teachers, on May 24, 2022; the school district police chief Pete Arredondo, was fired in August 2022 following pressure over his actions.
In spite of the immense amount of anguish felt by the families and the outpour of support that followed the incident, it appears that they have needlessly become a target of vicious internet rumor, which claims one parent attacked police.
Jordan Vonderhaar/Getty
The Claim
A tweet (since deleted) posted on September 29, 2022, showed what appeared to be a CNN story about a “Uvalde parent who shoved officers out of the way to get to her kids has just been sentenced to 8 years in prison for assaulting the officer.”
While the tweet was since deleted, Newsweek has saved the image it used below.
The Facts
While the tweet which shared the claim was later deleted, other sites have left its image online.
Website iFunny, an image hosting website which claims it “gives you a smile when you most need it”, posted the same image on 26 September, 2022.
However, not only is this a fabrication, but the allegations contained within it are false. The journalist whose byline is attached to the fake article, confirmed that she “wrote no such story” and that “CNN did not publish this.”
Searching for articles with the same headline yields no results.
One of the people included in the tweet also has nothing to do with the events Uvalde.
A photo of one woman, on the right of the fake CNN article, is Sarah Knysz, who was sentenced in 2013 for her involvement in the death of a Michigan state trooper.
Knysz, then 20, was jailed for between two and five years for accessory after the fact to a felon for helping her husband, Eric Knysz, escape after he shot state trooper Paul K Butterfield.
Eric Knysz, who was later convicted of the murder, was said to have killed himself in prison in 2014.
The image on the left of the collage was taken from a video recorded on the day of the shooting.
Newsweek has found no evidence that any parent of any of the children killed at Robb Elementary School, has been charged with offences relating to the tragic incident.
One parent, Angeli Rose Gomez, was reportedly handcuffed and threatened with arrest by officers, but was ultimately not charged.
There is no evidence to suggest that she “shoved” officers, has been charged with any crime or that she will serve eight years in prison.
Gomez, who ran into the school to save her two children, claims that she has been harassed by police officers for criticizing them since the shootings. A report by Jezebel states Gomez and intends to file a lawsuit in response.
Sadly, there is a history of families of victims of U.S. mass shootings becoming targets of misinformation and online hoaxes.
Perhaps most notably, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was ordered to pay $45.2 million in damages to Sandy Hook parents Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, for falsely claiming that the nation’s deadliest elementary school shooting was staged by “crisis actors.”
As Newsweek has reported previously, the use of images with news media logos and branding edited in is a common type of disinformation, with the logos of trustworthy news organizations—such as the BBC or CNN—used misleadingly to add credibility to a piece of content.
Newsweek has contacted iFunny and Uvalde Police for comment.
The Ruling
False.
No parent of any of the victims of the Uvalde shooting has been charged with assaulting a police officer. While one parent was reportedly handcuffed at the scene they were not arrested or charged.
The image of a a purported CNN article is a fabrication, as confirmed by the reporter the article was ascribed to. The woman in prisoner uniform is a 20-year-old who was charged in connection with the death of a Michigan State Trooper in 2013 and has nothing to do with the Uvalde shooting.
FACT CHECK BY Newsweek’s Fact Check team