A video showing a police officer violently arresting a man has been viewed thousands of times online in posts that claim it was filmed in Australia. But the video has been shared in a false context: it shows a police officer detaining a man in Canada.
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"An Australian police officer's use of excessive force caused serious injury to the back of a man's head," reads the Chinese-language caption alongside the video shared on Twitter on October 28, 2021.
Screenshot of the misleading post taken on November 4, 2021 The same video was viewed over 5,000 times on Twitter here and here alongside a similar claim.
Comments on the posts suggested some social media users were misled.
"How can this policeman be so violent? This is forcing the citizens to rebel. Australia has fallen so badly!" one commented.
"Scary! Under the tyranny of Australia, the police publicly murdering has become a norm", another wrote.
But the video has been shared in a false context.
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The footage has circulated in multiple news reports about a violent arrest by a police officer in Canada.
Canadian media organisation CBC published a longer version of the video in a report on July 22, 2020.
"Alberta's police watchdog is investigating a Tuesday arrest in Sherwood Park after a social media video surfaced that shows an RCMP officer taking down a man whose head slams into the concrete sidewalk and begins to bleed", the report reads.
"RCMP" is an acronym for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Below is a screenshot comparison of the video in the false posts (L) and the video in the CBC report (R):
The details of the incident correspond with this media release issued by the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team on July 25, 2020.
It states the police force launched an investigation into the conduct of the police officer after the incident on July 21, 2020.
It states: "While taking physical custody of the man, the officer took him to the ground, at which time the man's head struck the ground, resulting in a laceration and bleeding.
"Police tended to the man and placed him in the recovery position until EMS arrived. The man was transported to hospital, where he was examined to ensure that he had not sustained any serious head injury, treated for the minor head laceration, and released about 12 hours later."
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This Global News report published on July 22, 2020 about the same incident also includes the video shared in the misleading posts.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by BOOM staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
