Claim: A picture shows the woman police officer who was injured during a violent arrest at Manchester Airport in July 2024.
Fact: The claim is false as the image is of a Leicestershire police officer from a separate incident in September 2020, and not from the one at Manchester Airport in July 2024.
On 26 July 2024, Facebook user ‘Gaynor Salisbury’ posted (archive) a picture of a woman, with an injured nose and black eyes. The accompanying captions reads as follows:
“Why is this photo not being shown on the news? This young female police officer was assaulted, causing her to have a broken nose, at Manchester airport yesterday, when an altercation happened between a lady and her two sons and another passenger. The police were called and the sons became embroiled in a physical attack on this police woman. This resulted in more officers being called, one of which kicked one of the sons whilst he was on the ground. This was an absolutely horrific thing for this police officer to do and I do not condone his actions in any way. He should fully face the consequences of his outrageous actions. BUT… this was NOT an unprovoked attack by the police on these young men! Why are we once again hearing half a story? And why is there -strangely- no video footage of what occurred prior to what we are being shown???”
Manchester Airport arrests
Videos showing Greater Manchester Police (GMP) making violent arrests of several young men at the Manchester Airport went viral on social media on 24 July 2024, prompting outrage over what many termed an incident of “police brutality”. The footage shows armed security personnel kicking and stomping one of the men who was lying prone on the ground and another one sitting with his arms raised upwards.
Some of the clips, which also depict the mother of the detained individuals, can be viewed here, here, here, here, here, and here.
“A police officer armed with a Taser kicked and stamped on a man’s head as he was lying face down on the ground at Manchester Airport. A second man was also struck by the officer,” Sky News reported, adding that demonstrators “gathered outside Rochdale police station” to protest against the violence. Lawyer Akhmed Yakoob is representing two of the men from the video, it said.
The Telegraph reported that “the problem appears to have started on a flight from Pakistan that landed in Manchester on Tuesday evening”. An apparent verbal altercation had taken place between “a middle-aged woman of Asian descent and another passenger” aboard, it said, adding that as the aeroplane landed, “the same passenger, a man, began jostling her with his trolley and making racist remarks”.
The woman spoke to her sons about the incident and they “confronted him and an altercation ensued”, the publication said. “Police officers became aware of the altercation at or around 8.25 pm and began tracking the family through the airport using cameras,” it added, noting that they stopped them near the ticket machines.
The family has claimed police officers struck the mother in her face, stirring up the tension, but no video evidence was provided, according to the Daily Mail’s website, MailOnline. The publication also quoted Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham as saying that it was a “fast-moving and complicated situation” and there were “issues for both sides in the situation” but the circumstances were “not clear-cut”.
Burnham has posted updates through his official account here and here.
Videos that later emerged on social media — and linked above — show GMP officers confronting and “arresting two other men”, apparently of Asian descent, while one of the cops is seen “using incapacitant spray on a man who was filming the scene”, the publication added.
In an initial statement, the GMP said three of its officers “were subject to a violent assault, where they were punched to the ground” and the one “female officer suffered a broken nose”. It added, “Four men were arrested at the scene for affray and assault on emergency service workers.”
GMP Assistant Chief Constable Wasim Chaudhry, in a second statement, termed the incident an “unusual occurrence”. He announced that one male officer was “removed from operational duties and we are making a voluntary referral of our policing response to the Independent Office of Police Conduct [IOPC]”.
The GMP later announced that one police officer was suspended “from all duties”.
Manchester Airport also issued statements, vowing support for the investigation and to their colleagues impacted by the altercation.
Protests have erupted all over Manchester, at least two of which took place outside the Rochdale Police Station and Burnham’s office.
The Guardian quoted Dal Babu, a former chief superintendent of the Metropolitan police, as saying, “I think racism played a significant part in this.” It added that UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer knows of the incident and Paul Waugh, a member of the country’s Parliament, has issued a statement. The minister of state in the Home Office, Diana Johnson, and former MP George Galloway, also acknowledged the incident here and here.
The IOPC said it “will be independently investigating the level of force used by a @gmpolice officer” and further added that it was “conducting a criminal investigation into the use of force” during the incidents.
The BBC reported on 26 July that according to the watchdog, one “constable is to face a criminal investigation for assault” and that the officer’s “use of an incapacitant spray during the incident would form part of the criminal investigation”.
Days later, the publication said new footage published by the Manchester Evening News shows what transpired before the violent alteration went viral. As the two men in the viral video are standing near a ticket machine, officers approach one of them “in an attempt to restrain him” before punches “appear to be thrown by both the officer and the man”.
The BBC also mentioned that the men’s family has appealed for calm and said they have “no political agenda whatsoever”.
Fact or Fiction?
A reverse-image search revealed that the picture of the injured woman police officer is unrelated to the Manchester Airport arrests.
According to different reports by British media outlets, the police officer — identified as PC Maddie Hayes of Leicestershire Police, then 24 years old — was left with her nose “hanging off” after being attacked while on duty in Ashby de la Zouch, a town in the English county, in September 2020.
“Police said it happened when she went to handcuff a teenager who had been detained by other officers,” the BBC reported. She had to undergo surgery and got “six internal stitches and 11 external stitches to her nose”, it said, adding that she was helping search a 16-year-old boy detained over “concerns raised around his behaviour”.
Daily Star reported on 12 January 2021 that the boy “admitted causing grievous bodily harm” to the woman police officer during a court hearing and was “given a 12-month community service order”.
According to The Sun, Hayes said, “It does make me angry that I was out doing my job and I have been attacked in this way. It shouldn’t be accepted that I am attacked in my job and left with injuries like this.” The article also included other pictures of her wounded face.
Virality
Soch Fact Check found the claim posted here, here, and here on X (formerly Twitter).
It was also shared in multiple Facebook posts, some of which can be found here, here, here, and here.
Interestingly, many of the Facebook posts are actually from a photo from a now-deleted viral TikTok — archived here — on 25 July 2024 on TikTok, where it gained over 156,300 views, as of writing time.
The claim was also shared here and here on TikTok.
Conclusion: The viral image does not show the woman police officer who broke her nose during an altercation at Manchester Airport in July 2024. In fact, it depicts a Leicestershire constable who was attacked while making an arrest in September 2020.
Background image in cover photo: Moujib Aghrout
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