Fact Check

Did an Arizona Protester Threaten to Shoot Police?

This picture of a protest sign was first sent to Snopes in 2010.

Published May 17, 2010

 (superjoseph / Shutterstock)
Image Via superjoseph / Shutterstock
Claim:
Photograph shows a demonstrator at an immigration protest threatening to "shoot more Arizona police."

Readers first started sending this story to Snopes in 2010:

The Media will never show this but this is Arizona going down for the count.

I know john personally! THIS IS LEGIT! The photo was taken at a protest 5/1/10 in Phoenix!

I for one am OUTRAGED by this photo, taken the next day after a Pinal County Sheriffs Deputy was shot by Mexican Drug Runners with an AK-47 just a few miles from my home. THIS CRAP IS TAKING PLACE "IN MY BACKYARD"! YOU PEOPLE in other states Need to shut the hell up, and actuall READ THE PROPOSED LAW for yourselves, and NOT LISTEN TO THE RACEBAITERS like Sharpton and OBAMA! READ IT FOR YOURSELF THEN DECIDE IF IT IS RIGHT OR WRONG

I have about had enough.


Picture taken by one of my friends in Phoenix yesterday when all the illegals were protesting. This is shocking! Just keep poking us with those sticks, you bastards. We're fed up.

The above-displayed image was purportedly taken at a May Day Immigation Rally in Phoenix, Arizona, on 1 May 2010 (in response to that state's passage of a controversial immigration law). It seemingly shows one participant holding a sign which threatens the "shooting of more Arizona police" (a reference to an incident on 30 April 2010 in which Pinal County Sheriff's Deputy Louie Puroll was wounded in a shooting by suspected illegal immigrants) if the protesters are not afforded free health care, no-tax jobs, housing, and food.

Clearly this photograph was not taken at a protest in Phoenix, but rather during a similar demonstration in Los Angeles (as indicated by the presence of the Los Angeles Times complex in the background) likely held on the same day.

Although it is often claimed that this photograph is a hoax and that the wording of the protester's sign has been altered through digital manipulation, we have found no other different version of this image that could conceivably be the unaltered original. But neither have we seen this picture attributed to any source nor claimed by any photographer, so its status remains "undetermined."

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