QUESTION:
Are carjackers luring victims with $100 bills?
ANSWER:
No, this is a hoax that has resurfaced again on social media.
SOURCES:
Clarksville Police Department, Karen Straughn Assistant Attorney General at Maryland Attorney General's Office
PROCESS:
When our Verify team saw a Facebook post about people leaving $100 bills randomly on people's cars, we thought "Awesome!" I mean, Lesli Foster was out handing out hundred dollar bills a couple of weeks ago for random acts of kindness, and everything was peachy.
Our researchers traced the story back to 3 years ago when it first popped up on Facebook, in September 2014 the Clarksville Police Department in Tennessee squashed the rumors has it was nothing more than a social media hoax and advising that hackers can lure you in with fake posts like this.
But that didn't stop people from spreading the rumor. A few months later, the hoax got a big boost when Maryland Assistant Attorney General Karen Straughn put out a similar warning.
So what gives? We got ahold of Straughn, who says, at the time, she was reporting what she heard from a resident in Baltimore County.
The Assistant Attorney General no longer believes there is a threat to the public and confirmed no police report was ever filed in that first case or anytime in the three years since.
And as for the DC area, our researchers checked in with the Metropolitan Police who say they've had zero reports on this type of incident ever happening.
So yet again just another event of an urban legend rearing its ugly head on social media.
