Did the Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps arrest Judge Sharon Coleman, a federal judge in Illinois, on March 19, 2024? No, that's not true: A spokesperson for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois told Lead Stories that "there is absolutely no truth" to this claim. The article that made this claim was published on a website that publishes fabricated content.
The claim appeared in an article published by Real Raw News on March 20, 2024. Titled "JAG Arrests Illegal Alien-Loving, Deep State Judge" (archived here), the article began:
Although involved in a dozen complex endeavors from coast to coast and abroad, White Hats have allocated resources and personnel to pursue, capture, and incarcerate liberal Deep State judges for subverting the Constitution, a document penned in indelible ink by the Founding Fathers. On March 19, U.S. Navy Jag investigators arrested on treason charges U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Coleman of the Northern District of Illinois, following her de facto ruling that allows illegal immigrants, including felons, to own firearms on U.S. soil.
Users on social media only saw this title, description and thumbnail:
(Source: Real Raw News screenshot taken on Fri Mar 22 15:29:37 2024 UTC)
Lead Stories contacted Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman's office at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois for a statement in response to the claim that she was arrested by the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate Corps (JAG) for treason. Julie Hodek, a public information officer for the U.S. District Court, responded via email on March 22, 2024:
In response to your inquiry, there is absolutely no truth to that statement.
The article also claimed that Vice Adm. Darse E. Crandall said Coleman committed treason. Crandall's name has been used multiple times in conspiracy articles published by Real Raw News. These present him as leading extrajudicial military tribunals and executions, which are a popular QAnon trope. A site-specific Google search for the term "Vice Adm. Crandall" (archived here) brings up more than 70 articles about events that didn't happen -- claims that Crandall had announced the arrests of notable people, death sentences and hangings.
A search (archived here) of the U.S. Navy JAG's website, using a sentence taken directly from the Real Raw News article about the supposed Coleman arrest, produced no results to substantiate this claim.
Lead Stories contacted the Office of the Secretary of Defense and will update this fact check if a response is received.
Real Raw News
Real Raw News has a long history of publishing false claims in mock news stories, many of them about convictions and executions of various public figures at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. For example, the site reported former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was hanged (she wasn't); former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta was executed (he wasn't); and "the military" convicted former Attorney General William Barr on charges of treason (it didn't).
The website for Real Raw News includes a disclaimer that declares the site does not stand by the contents of the stories, calling them entertainment. Specifically, it says:
Information on this website is for informational and educational and entertainment purposes. ... We have included this disclaimer for our protection, on the advice on legal counsel.
(Source: RealRawNews.com screenshot taken Tue Aug 3 16:39:48 UTC 2021)
Previous Lead Stories debunks of claims by Real Raw News are collected here.
