London, Ont., police are working with Western University officials and interviewing students after reports that up to 30 young women were drugged and sexually assaulted at a first-year residence over the weekend.
"Let me state from the outset that these are serious and disturbing allegations and they've been taken seriously from the onset," said London police Chief Steve Williams at a virtual media briefing on Tuesday afternoon.
But police have not received any reports about the alleged drugging or sexual assaults at Medway-Sydenham Hall over the weekend or in recent days, Williams added, despite thousands of comments on Instagram and the video-sharing app TikTok claiming incidents happened at the residence.
"The allegations surfaced, at least for us, on social media. We all know how information misinformation swirls around social media, and we have to take that into account," Williams said.
Social media can be a help and a hindrance during investigations, he added.
"Many investigations involve some aspects of social media and our investigators know that. It's really a matter of knocking on doors and talking to people to get the facts, and that's exactly what we started doing yesterday [Monday] and we'll continue to ... see where the investigation takes us."
Student arrested, released
Police also dispelled rumours that the death of first-year student Gabriel Neil, 18, is in any way connected to the sexual assault investigation.
"These two incidents should in no way be...
Read Full Story: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/police-probing-western-university-sexual-violence-allegations-work-to-separate-fact-from-social-media-fiction-1.6175607
Your content is great. However, if any of the content contained herein violates any rights of yours, including those of copyright, please contact us immediately by e-mail at media[@]kissrpr.com.