By Dorcas Marfo and Adrian Ghobrial
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TORONTO (CTV Network) — When Michael Mallinson woke up from his afternoon nap on Wednesday, the phone was already ringing.
On the other end was his daughter, panicked and shouting, telling him to delete all his social media accounts. She told her father that his name and photo was circulating online in connection with the shooting of U.S. conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“I was quite alarmed,” Mallinson, 77, told CTV News senior correspondent Adrian Ghobrial in an interview Thursday. “You never want to have your name out and about.”
When Michael Mallinson woke up from his afternoon nap on Wednesday, the phone was already ringing.
On the other end was his daughter, panicked and shouting, telling him to delete all his social media accounts. She told her father that his name and photo was circulating online in connection with the shooting of U.S. conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“I was quite alarmed,” Mallinson, 77, told CTV News senior correspondent Adrian Ghobrial in an interview Thursday. “You never want to have your name out and about.”
What Mallinson discovered was that an old photo of him lifted from a deleted X account, had been attached to claims spreading across social media. The posts alleged he was the suspect in Kirk’s shooting.
Mallinson said the false claim came from another X account.
“I googled my name right away,” he said. “Fortunately, it allayed my fears … it was a story saying my image did not match the image of the person who had been arrested by the police.”
U.S. authorities said two people were detained Wednesday, but neither was determined to be connected to the shooting.
As of early Thursday evening, Kirk’s killer remains unidentified and at large. Investigators have also released two images of the person.
The unidentified person of interest is believed to have jumped off a roof and fled into a neighbourhood after firing one shot, U.S. authorities said Thursday. A high-powered, bolt-action rifle they believe was used in the attack was recovered, and video recordings of the person they believe was responsible are being reviewed.
Kirk’s assassination highlights escalating threats of political violence in the U.S. that cut across the ideological spectrum.
Mallinson, a retired banker, now spends much of his time rowing and educating with patient advocacy groups for axial spondylarthritis – a chronic, immune-mediated disease-causing inflammation primarily in the spine.
Around 2:20 p.m. EST, when Kirk was shot at a Utah college event, Mallinson was in Toronto running errands with his wife. They had gone to Yorkdale mall, stopped by a luggage shop and later returned home, where he took a nap.
“I’m just a quiet, ordinary guy,” he said.
Within moments, Mallinson and his family began receiving abusive messages, adding that he received “nasty” messages on Facebook calling him “all sorts of names.”
When asked whether he felt like his safety was in jeopardy, Mallinson said “ultimately, yes.”
“Once something is up on social media, it’s very hard to get rid of, so I’m worried about the longer-term repercussions of it, as well,” he added.
“(If) somebody gets hold of this piece of information a few months from now and doesn’t know the context of it, doesn’t know that it’s total misinformation … they may just get hold of that…and act on it,” Mallinson said.
The incident forced him to deactivate his Facebook, Instagram and Threads accounts, with Facebook being where he primarily connects with patient groups around the world.
“I was pretty loathed to delete myself from Facebook and sever those relationships without being able to tell them why,” Mallinson said.
Though Mallinson insists he wants to live “in obscurity,” his ordeal reflects a broader reality: the speed of false information.
Mallinson’s story isn’t unique. Canadian research shows misinformation spread rapidly, especially on social media platforms, even when many users try to verify what they see.
A 2021 report from Evidence for Democracy found that more than 90 per cent of Canadians say they encountered misleading or false information online, and more than 40 per cent admit having believed something that later turned out to be untrue.
“I’m very much about evidence-based information. So this whole idea of fake information, fake news, misinformation, doesn’t sit well with me. I just don’t really understand why people get involved in that,” he said.
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