Is a man named Samuel Hyde the suspected shooter at the shooting at Florida State University on April 17, 2025? No, that's not true: Comedian Sam Hyde is often named as the perpetrator by internet trolls whenever a mass-casualty incident happens. It is a bizarre in-joke that has been going on for years, often using variations of his name to make it sound more local.
An example of the claim appeared in a post on X (archived here) published on April 17, 2025 with the text:
🚨 #BREAKING: ACTIVE SHOOTER SITUATION AT FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY
There are claims that the shooter is a man called Samuel Hyde. Nothing officially verified yet.
On April 17, 2025 there was indeed an active shooter situation at Florida State University according to several breaking news reports. But none of them reported Samuel (or Sam) Hyde was the shooter.
"Sam Hyde is the killer" joke
As part of a bizarre internet in-joke, comedian Sam Hyde gets blamed for almost every mass shooting or headline-grabbing assasination that happens, often within minutes of the event. The joke originally started on 4chan and has been perpetuated for years by various troll accounts.
Often the false claims use a picture of Hyde posing with a weapon, such as this one:
You can read our previous fact checks mentioning his name here.
