No evidence mosque shooters were a ‘transgender couple’

A shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego earlier this month left three victims dead: Mansour Kaziha, 78, Nadir Awad, 57, and Amin Abdullah, 51, according to The Associated Press.

Kaziha was a handyman, cook and caretaker at the mosque; Awad’s wife is a teacher at the school; and Abdullah, a guard at the center, is credited with keeping the shooters away from others while beginning a lockdown protocol.

The shooters, identified as Caleb Liam Vazquez, 18, and Cain Lee Clark, 17, killed themselves after shooting the three men, the AP said.

Following the May 18 tragedy, information about the teens began circulating on social media.

“(The suspects were) identified as a transgender couple by classmates” one May 19 X post read. Another X post that same day said, police are “refusing” to name the shooters. “Why, you ask? BECAUSE IT WAS A TRANS COUPLE.”

But these posts are misleading, according to PolitiFact. There is no evidence that the shooters were a “transgender couple.”

Throughout the briefings and in videos issued by the San Diego Police Department or the FBI, there was no mention of the teens being transgender or a romantic couple.

The police did issue a statement that Vazquez and Clark were both San Diego residents who met online, “exchanged radicalized ideology” and shared a “hatred of various religions and races.”

“These subjects did not discriminate on who they hated,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Mark Remily said during a May 19 press briefing.

Replacement ballots not illegal

President Donald Trump recently accused Maryland officials of sending out illegal mail-in ballots.

“In Maryland, they sent out 500,000 Illegal Mail In Ballots, and they got caught! So now, they’re going to send out 500,000 more Mail In Ballots, but nobody knows what’s happening with the first 500,000 they sent,” Trump wrote May 18 on Truth Social. “In addition, many of these Ballots went to Democrats, so any Republican running in Maryland doesn’t have a chance!”

But that’s not accurate, according to The Associated Press. Some replacement ballots were issued due to a vendor error.

The Maryland State Board of Elections said that some voters received a primary ballot for the wrong party. Those voters received a replacement ballot and any original ballots that were sent in will be voided. Additionally, voters who had not returned the original ballots were instructed to destroy them.

Ballot envelopes include a unique identifier to ensure that each voter can only vote once. No party has an advantage over another because Republicans and Democrats vote in separate primaries in Maryland.

“It bears repeating that no fake OR illegal mail-in ballots were distributed,” Maryland’s state administrator of elections Jared DeMarinis wrote in a May 18 X post. “The wording in President Trump's continued posts about Maryland's elections creates an environment of misinformation on a voting right. Mail-in voting is not a partisan issue. Mail-in voting is legal.”

No one arrested for sandwich photo

Recent social media posts claim a man in England was charged for posting a photo of a bacon sandwich.

“A man ‌just got charged under Section 5 Public Order Act — a ‘hate crime’ — for posting a photo of a bacon butty online,” read a May 18 Facebook post. “GMP’s ⁠Hate Crime Unit claims it caused ‘harassment, alarm and distress’ to Muslims. Yes, really. Grilled pork = Islamophobia now.”

The post includes a photo of a “Greater Manchester Police Charge Sheet.” The document appears to be from the GMP Hate Crime Unit and the charge is described as John Smith of Manchester used “disorderly behavior, namely by posting an image of a bacon sandwich on social media, within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress.”

Although the form is stamped “OFFICIAL” at the bottom, it is not official, according to Reuters. The document, and the post, are fake. Posting photos of food is not illegal.

To clear things up, the Greater Manchester Police issued a post on X.

“This image is a clear fake and has been reported to X for removal. In the meantime, we urge users (to refrain) from sharing such nonsense,” police said.

Woman stuck in tube is AI

A video posted to social media this month appears to show a large woman, upside down and stuck in a waterslide tube, as a firefighter tries to remove some of the tube to get her out.

The woman appears to say “Oh, my God,” as the firefighter is working.

A version of the clip on X included the comment, “If you need motivation to stay off the cookie aisle, this may be it.”

But this video is fake, according to Lead Stories. The clip was created using artificial intelligence, or AI.

AI detection tools indicated the video was 100% “likely to be AI-generated.” Additionally, water in the tube appears to be flowing upward toward the woman and her mouth doesn’t move when she says, “Oh, my God.”

Also, this incident was not reported by any credible news organizations.

• Bob Oswald is a veteran Chicago-area journalist and former news editor of the Elgin Courier-News. Contact him at boboswald33@gmail.com.