A video posted to Facebook that has been viewed over 33,000 times incorrectly suggests that it shows police in a British street arresting people holding a party during the coronavirus pandemic lockdown.
The video, which was posted on April 15, 2020, carries the caption: “Lockdown Street party cancelled”, without giving any further details (here). In a comment beneath the video, the Facebook user who posted it makes the claim: “This was today”.
This information is false. The incident in the video took place when police were called to what was reported as a “large disturbance” in Scunthorpe, northern England, in May 2019.
Screen grabs from the video posted to Facebook can be seen in a local newspaper report (here).
The first screen grab in the article matches the scene at the 4:41 timecode on the Facebook video. The second screen grab appears at 3.11 in the video and the third screen grab appears at 3.39.
On April 15, 2020, the date the video was published to Facebook, the Grimsby Telegraph published a report about an April 12 incident in Scunthorpe in which Humberside Police had to intervene after a lockdown party spilled into the street (here) . This incident occurred on a different street to the 2019 disturbance.
VERDICT
False. The video shows police responding to an incident in Scunthorpe that occurred in May 2019.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our work to fact-check social media posts here .
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.