The claim: A serial killer and burglar are on the run after killing 3 police officers
A Jan. 27 Facebook post (direct link, archived link) claims a man and woman are at large after a deadly altercation with police. The post includes side-by-side photos of purported suspects with distinctive facial tattoos.
“Please lock your doors and stay vigilant,” the post reads. “A dangerous couple Husband serial Killer Ryan Edward (41) and the woman Alice Chapman (32), a House Burglar are on the run after killing 3 female police officers on Saturday here in #Burlington.”
The post was shared more than 24,000 times in one week, and similar claims circulated on Facebook and Instagram claiming the man was on the loose in other locations, including San Antonio, Texas.
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Our rating: False
The post misidentifies the people in the photos. Officials have called the post a “hoax,” and no credible news reports support its claims.
Police in other states debunk similar posts
Different versions of the post have circulated online, frequently substituting the alleged suspects’ photos and last-known whereabouts. But the images actually show Joanne Dennehy and Christopher Russell.
Dennehy’s photo appeared in several news reports about a widely covered 2013 crime spree in which she murdered three men in the U.K. She is currently serving a life sentence in the U.K., according to court documents.
Russell was arrested in March 2020 as part of an unrelated investigation in Hobart, Indiana, according to a news release from the local police department at the time. That release included an image of Russell with the same facial tattoos as the man featured in the Facebook post identified as “Ryan Edward.”
Russell was convicted of burglary in 2020 and sentenced to three years in prison, according to the Indiana Department of Corrections.
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Some posts made nearly identical claims but changed the alleged suspects’ photos and ages. Others said the supposed fugitives were at large in Des Moines, Iowa, and San Antonio, Texas. But there are no credible news reports about people on the run after killing three police officers in either place.
“Our Southwest Texas Fusion center has deemed this post a hoax/scam,” San Antonio police officer Ricardo Guzman told USA TODAY. “It has been circulating in various counties and states with different information in each post. However, the information is false.”
The Altoona Police Department in Iowa posted a statement on Facebook, advising people not to react to or share the content.
Emotional or seemingly urgent messaging that encourages users to share a post can indicate a scam, according to the nonprofit Better Business Bureau. Scammers may wait for users to share the content before replacing it with an advertisement, survey or sales pitch. Such posts are often shared in local buy-and-sell groups, where a sense of community and trust is already established, BBB reported.
USA TODAY reached out to the user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
PolitiFact also debunked the claim.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Posts about alleged serial killer Ryan Edward a ‘hoax’ | Fact check
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