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On 8 July 2016, the web site Conservative Treehouse published an article that perpetuated several false rumors about the death of Philando Castile, who was shot and killed by police officers during a traffic stop in Minnesota. Among those rumors was the claim that Castile was wanted for armed robbery and was illegally carrying a firearm: The claim that Castile was pulled over because he matched the profile of an armed robbery suspect is based on audio obtained by Minneapolis/St. Paul television station KARE, which purportedly captured officers discussing the reason for the traffic stop before the shooting occurred: Although the KARE report noted that the audio was provided by a viewer and had not been authenticated by officials, the license plate number mentioned in the audio did match Castile's car, and an alert had been issued about an armed robbery that occurred a few days before the shooting. But while this audio may document that a police officer thought Castile might have resembled a person wanted for armed robbery, that didn't mean he was a suspect in an armed robbery case or that he was wanted for armed robbery, as both phrases imply some form of substantive evidence had specifically tied Castile to the crime. But at the time he was killed, nothing linked Castile to such a crime other than that an officer momentarily thought Castile might have looked a little like someone who had committed a robbery. The Conservative Treehouse took their shaky narrative a step further, however, and attempted to show that not only was Castile a suspect in an armed robbery case, but he was likely the man who committed the crime. The evidence provided, however, was flimsy at best: The Conservative Treehouse claimed that the image on the left of the above-displayed graphic shows a gun on Castile's hip. While most viewers have a hard time even identifying the object seen in this picture, Conservative Treehouse boldly speculated that it was the very same weapon used in the armed robbery pictured on the right: This is a far-fetched if not outright false claim. The object pictured on the left of the above-displayed image can hardly be identified as a gun, let alone a specific make and model of gun that can be matched to a blurry a picture of a robbery. The web site also attempted to prove that Castile was involved in the armed robbery by connecting an image of Diamond Reynolds holding a pack of Newport cigarettes with a news story stating that an armed robber stole cartons of the same brand of cigarettes: Of course, the fact that Reynolds was seen holding the same brand of cigarettes that were stolen days prior to her boyfriend's death is hardly proof of anything. The Newport brand represents more than 10% of the market share for cigarettes, according to the CDC, which consisted of more than 40 million smokers in 2014. This is a trivial detail at best and a coincidence at worst. The Convservative Treehouse article also perpetuated the rumor that Castile was illegally carrying a firearm: The above-displayed tweet is real and Conservative Treehouse actually did provide some context for the message. However, they also incorrectly concluded that there was no factual evidence that Castile had a carry permit: While this Tweet was used as proof that Castile didn't have a carry permit (Minnesota actually makes no distinction between open carry and concealed carry), the police station refuted this report on social media: The police department also linked to a Star Tribune article which had confirmed that Castile indeed had a carry permit: A copy of the letter that accompanied the issuance of Castile's carry permit was later posted online. The Conservative Treehouse article employed a series of half-truths, misleading claims, and unsupported speculation in an attempt to justify the fatal force used by an officer during a traffic stop in Minnesota. No real evidence has yet come to light supporting the notion that Castile had been involved in an armed robbery or was carrying a firearm illegally when he was killed.
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