Gilroyans were victims of a hoax alleging that gang violence,
and specifically the murder of three women, would occur at Wal-Mart
Thursday night.
Gilroyans were victims of a hoax alleging that gang violence, and specifically the murder of three women, would occur at Wal-Mart Thursday night.
Text messages were sent among residents throughout Thursday and perhaps earlier, residents said. Variations of the text message said that gang violence had occurred or was about to occur that night.
“There was no issues of concern at the Gilroy Wal-Mart last evening,” Sgt. John Sheedy.
Variations on the Wal-Mart hoax have existed since 2005, according to snopes.com, which tracks hoaxes and pranks. In addition, law enforcement agencies from as far north as the East Bay reported a similar text message hoax Thursday.
Where this latest spate of messages originated from is unclear, Sheedy said. To try to prosecute someone for any offenses related to the prank presents another problem, he said.
“The issue is where do you go to start with that – what jurisdiction did it start in, who handles it,” Sheedy said.
Wal-Mart media representatives did not respond directly to the hoax, but said they would send over a press release, which was never received by the Dispatch.
As for future instances of similar hoaxes, there’s not much police can do, Sheedy said.
“With today’s tech is this unusual, absolutely not,” he said. “An individual person has to assess the information as do we do. It would be no different from someone calling your home phone and making a prank phone call.”
However, police did not want to discourage residents from calling if they believed there was a real danger.
“If you think that it’s serious, you have an obligation to notify authorities,” Sheedy said.
