What was claimed
The 30-year-old man arrested after a three-year-old boy was injured in a crocodile attack is called Adanawa Bolwada.
Our verdict
False. A 30-year-old man has been arrested and bailed in connection with the incident, but this is not his name.
Posts on social media have incorrectly named a person arrested in connection to an incident which saw a three-year-old child injured in a crocodile enclosure as “Adanawa Bolwada”.
A 30-year-old man was arrested and bailed in connection with the incident, which happened at a zoo near Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire last week. However he has not been named, and Full Fact has confirmed with police that the name being shared online is not correct.
Cambridgeshire Constabulary reportedly said that the man who was arrested is white-British, is not believed to have known the child, and is understood to have learning disabilities. He was released on bail until 18 September after being assessed as “not being fit for interview”.
The incorrect name has also been shared by Grok, the AI chatbot created by Elon Musk’s start-up xAI, though it later acknowledged this “remains unverified social media speculation”. We’ve contacted xAI for comment.
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Full Fact often sees people being mistakenly identified during significant events such as this, and we have previously fact checked a number of claims in which the wrong person has been identified in the aftermath of a major incident. It’s important to consider whether what you are seeing is accurate before sharing.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because the police have said ‘Adanawa Bolwada’ is not the name of the person arrested.
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