Was Derek Chauvin, the police officer accused of murdering George Floyd himself killed in prison and did he leave half of his estate to the Trump campaign? No, that's not true. The story was published by a liberal satire website that tries to mislead Trump supporters and Republicans into sharing made up stories that are clearly marked as satire when you actually click them. Articles from the site are frequently copied by foreign-run fake news websites. The people liking and sharing these stories are enriching foreign website operators or a liberal from Maine via the ad revenue generated with the content which is probably not what they expected or wanted.
This particular article (archived here) was published on August 19,2020 by a website named Conservative Tears under the title "Police Officer Who Murdered George Floyd Killed in Prison". It opened:
Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police officer who murdered George Floyd, has been found dead in the jail where he's been held since May 2020. He was apparently killed by fellow inmates.
Even more shocking than his death at the hands of fellow prisoners is the fact that his will leaves half of his estate to the reelection campaign for impeached President Donald J. Trump. He was so excited about Trump's win that he updated his will right after Trump's election in 2016 to include that bequest.
What's *not* unexpected? That estate amounts to $34 and a George Foreman grill leftover from Chauvin's days as a vain gym rat who tried to eat well -- if by "eat well" you mean that donuts were limited to breakfast, lunch, and afternoon pre-nap snack. It remains to be seen how much the grill will fetch on the resale market for worn-out countertop appliances owned by disgusting, murderous racist pieces of sh*t.
The article was literally published under a category named "Death Hoax" on a website with a subheader that reads "Death Hoaxes For Your Thoughts And Prayers". In reality Chauvin was released on bail in October 2020 and is currently awaiting trial. But the story recently went somewhat viral again after reapparing in certain Facebook groups and pages.
The site Conservative Tears is part of the "America's Last Line of Defense" network of satire websites run by self-professed liberal troll Christopher Blair from Maine along with a loose confederation of friends and allies. He runs several websites and Facebook pages with visible satire disclaimers everywhere. They mostly publish made-up stories with headlines specifically created to trigger Republicans, conservatives and evangelical Christians into angrily sharing or commenting on the story on Facebook without actually reading the full article, exposing them to mockery and ridicule by fans of the sites and pages.
Every site in the network has an about page that reads (in part):
About Satire
Before you complain and decide satire is synonymous with "comedy":sat·ire
ˈsaˌtī(ə)r
noun
The use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.Everything on this website is fiction. It is not a lie and it is not fake news because it is not real. If you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined. Any similarities between this site's pure fantasy and actual people, places, and events are purely coincidental and all images should be considered altered and satirical. See above if you're still having an issue with that satire thing.
Articles from Blair's sites frequently get copied by "real" fake news sites who omit the satire disclaimer and other hints the stories are fake. One of the most persistent networks of such sites is run by a man from Pakistan named Kashif Shahzad Khokhar (aka "DashiKashi") who has spammed hundreds of such stolen stories into conservative and right-wing Facebook pages in order to profit from the ad revenue.
When fact checkers point this out to the people liking and sharing these copycat stories some of them get mad at the fact checkers instead of directing their anger at the foreign spammers or the liberal satire writers. Others send a polite "thank you" note, which is much appreciated.
NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalist to rank the reliability of websites, describes conservativetears.com as:
A network of sites that publish false stories and hoaxes that are often mistaken for real news, run by hoax perpetrator Christopher Blair.
According to NewsGuard the site does not maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability. Read their full assessment here.
