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Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2021

Did a military tribunal find Tom Hanks guilty of pedophilia and child endangerment, and then execute him?

Marlo Lee, Lead Stories

no

An article on the site Real Raw News made the claim that Hanks was convicted and executed, but a Pentagon spokesperson told Lead Stories the claim was "completely false."

In fact, the "About Us" page for Real Raw News has a disclaimer that clearly states (with boldface words as they appear on the site): "Information on this website is for informational and educational and entertainment purposes. This website contains humor, parody, and satire."

In other words, the story is not based on facts, by the site's own admission.

Still, that does not stop social media users from sharing such articles without the disclaimer of humor or satire, passing the fictional writings off as real news.

Lead Stories has debunked several stories from Real Raw News involving such figures as Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and James Comey.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.

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Fact briefs are bite-sized, well-sourced explanations that offer clear "yes" or "no" answers to questions, confusions, and unsupported claims circulating online. They rely on publicly available data and documents, often from the original source. Fact briefs are written and published by Gigafact contributor publications.

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Lead Stories is a fact checking and debunking website at the intersection of big data and journalism that launched in 2015. It scouts for trending stories, images, videos and posts that contain false information in order to fact check them as quickly as possible. It actively monitors the fake-news ecosystem and doesn’t wait for reader tips or reports before getting started on a story.

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