Death Hoax

Were Dalton Knecht, Clayton Kershaw, Andre Iguodala and many other sports celebrities and their associates fatally shot, "while tryiпg to break υp a bar fight"? No, that's not true: Nearly identical stories mentioning them and other people were published by a network of foreign websites and Facebook pages. There were no credible news articles about such events. The Knecht version…

We agree with some very prominent people. Here's our proposal... Fact Checking Day on April 2, 2026 marks almost a year since Lead Stories published our last fact check as part of Meta's Third-Party Fact Checking Partnership. Since that day we've published over 1500 fact checks on our U.S. website on topics ranging from fake Epstein Files emails mentioning Elon…

Did Chuck Norris die on March 19, 2026? Yes, that's true: His family released the statement cited by multiple credible media organizations. Previously, the actor had been the subject of multiple death hoaxes. The news was reported in an article (archived here) published by the AP on March 20, 2026, under the title: Chuck Norris, martial arts master and actor…

Does a viral image show Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shaking hands with Israeli Defense Forces soldiers in March 2026 amid rumors of his death? No, that's not true: The photo has been online since 2018. As of this writing, no credible media outlet has reported that Netanyahu was wounded or killed in the most recent round of escalation in…

Does a mid-twentieth-century photograph capture the consequences of a transorbital lobotomy performed on a man named "James Peterson" for being gay in 1948? No, that's not true: The image is not a photograph -- it's an image generated by the AI tool Grok, as a barely visible watermark in the bottom right corner indicated. The content of the picture contradicts…

Did Jon Stewart broadcast a livestream about the Virginia Giuffre case and did the show get 3.2 billion views globally? No, that's not true: There is no evidence such a show was ever broadcast. Giuffre was one of the women who accused Jeffrey Epstein and others of sexual abuse as a teenager. The website and Facebook pages spreading the claim…

Did CNN report that an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who "un-alived" Minnesota nurse Alex Pretti and claimed "self-defense" was found "not-guilty"? No, that's not true: A search across the network's website did not show any CNN story saying that happened. Talking to Lead Stories, CNN's spokesperson said that the claim is false. As of this writing, none of the…

Was Alex Pretti fired over complaints of inappropriate conduct with patients three months before federal agents fatally shot him on a Minneapolis street? No, that's not true: The claim was started by a spam factory based in Vietnam that uses artificial tools to publish fake articles promoted by Facebook pages also managed from Vietnam. The article named the wrong hospital…

Was Alex Pretti's nursing license expired when he was shot to death by ICE agents on a Minneapolis street on January 24, 2026? No, that's not true: The Minnesota Board of Nursing's online credential search webpage showed Pretti's registered nursing license, which was issued on January 19, 2021, was set to expire on March 31, 2026. An image shared in…

Did a boy scout named Eric Langford disappear in the Airondirac forests of New York State in 1989 and did he mysteriously return in 2001? No, that's not true: The fictional tale about a kidnapping appeared on a YouTube channel that published fake stories about mysterious disappearances in the past. Several details in the story don't match up with reality…