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On 15 February 2016, the web site The Daily Caller published an article about an altercation involving Marine veteran Christopher Marquez. The item was written entirely from information provided by Marquez himself (supplemented by information obtained by The Daily Caller from police and the McDonald's at which the altercation occurred), and held: A number of subsequent articles appeared on numerous web sites, all seemingly sourced primarily or solely from The Daily Caller's report. USMC Life, Washington Times, New York Daily News, Daily Mail, and Fox News all carried near-identical iterations of the claim. The latter added: The Washington Post appeared to be largely alone in independently verifying Marquez's account outside The Daily Caller's original item, reporting that the incident occurred at a McDonald's on the 900 block of E Street NW. The paper confirmed that police were unable to verify some of Marquez's claims, adding that surveillance video of the altercation wasn't immediately conclusive: The bulk of other outlets' reporting seemed to be nothing but unvetted statements from Marquez to The Daily Caller and other outlets. The reporting was uncritical, despite Marquez's own admission that his memory of the attack was spotty. (In one account, Marquez stated that his recollection was jogged by a phone call with Mason about the incident, revealing that some of the details he remembered were possibly described or suggested to him after the fact.) We attempted to contact Mason (the manager with whom The Daily Caller discussed the security footage) but were unsuccessful in reaching him. Another manager at the restaurant said Mason might call us back. We also spoke with an officer from Washington D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department about the widely-circulated claims, who confirmed that Marquez was involved in an altercation at the McDonald's in question on 12 February 2016. The officer said records indicated that after an interaction between the individuals involved and Marquez, one of the four males allegedly called him a racist. No details were available about the conversation or events which led up to that point, and even that detail was provided solely by Marquez. We asked whether multiple news reports citing the Black Lives Matter movement were supported by police records. The officer said there was no indication that any of the individuals were involved with (or even mentioned) Black Lives Matter. The officer confirmed that Marquez was robbed, but we were unable to corroborate reports that his credit cards were used at a Five Guys or a Walmart (or how teens were able to use the cards at a liquor store). Finally, we asked about Marquez's assertion the teens were sought by police for a previous incident. The officer said that claim did not match the report. So while it's true Marquez was involved in an altercation and subsequently robbed, the identities of the suspects remained unknown. Police in Washington, D.C. told us that there was no evidence of a link between the dispute and Black Lives Matter activism, nor did any police reports suggest the teens were already wanted for a previous incident. On 18 February 2016, the YouTube channel DC Metropolitan Police Department published a video titled Persons of Interest in Agg. Assault/Robbery (Pickpocket), 900 b/o E St, NW, on February 12, 2016, along with a statement: The video footage did not feature an audio component. On 23 February 2016, WUSA reported two teens were arrested in connection with the incident; WTVR added that police made no mention of motive:
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