The ‘callous and inhumane’ school shooting hoaxes are still happening around the US. Here’s what we know
The ‘callous and inhumane’ school shooting hoaxes are still happening around the US. Here’s what we know
In two more days people will have to go through another moment of shock and disbelief as they learn that people who had apparently committed the worst mass shooting in the history of the nation — a school shooting in which nearly a dozen children and adults were murdered — turned out to be actors: actors who were paid more than $1 million and were trained in how to pose as the victims of a crime.
The shooting in Santa Fe, New Mexico, that left 10 people dead on Friday was the latest act of mass carnage that has been perpetrated — or staged — in the name of the entertainment industry.
More than 30 actors have been accused or convicted in connection with the alleged abuse or death of real victims of sex crimes, drug-related crimes or other crimes.
Here’s a list of five of the most egregious hoaxes, which were investigated by members of law enforcement and resulted in the arrests, the discovery of falsified evidence and the arrests of actors who were paid more than $1 million to perpetrate false crimes.
1. A man hired a hit-man to kill his ex-wife and his sister
In June 2012, police in San Bernardino, California, arrested Juan Carlos Cruz, the man who fired a gun inside a nightclub and killed a woman, his sister and a bystander. Three months after the shooting, his ex-wife identified Cruz as her husband and showed authorities a letter found in his car that included the account of how she had threatened him, saying he “was going to end [her] life and that she’d rather die than to live to be with him.” She said that since Cruz did not support her right to choose the life she wanted and would not leave her, she had decided to end the relationship.
In a separate letter, Cruz wrote, “[W]hatever happens to me it will be my choice of the end or the death.”
Authorities found out about the two letters by reviewing Cruz’s phone records that showed he had been in touch with his sister. So, when the case was taken to trial, investigators also found evidence that Cruz had hired a hit man to
