What was claimed
Thomas Hughes has been attacked in prison.
Our verdict
There’s no evidence this is true.
Father of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes has not been attacked in prison
8 December 2021
A number of Facebook posts, including one with over 90,000 shares, claim that Thomas Hughes has been attacked in prison and is in “critical condition”.
Hughes was recently jailed for 21 years and his partner, Emma Tustin, was jailed for a minimum 29 years over the torture and killing of his six-year-old son, Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, in 2020.
The Sun reported on 8 December that a Ministry of Justice (MoJ) spokesperson had said: “The governor of the prison has been contacted. It seems to be a rumour. There is no suggestion there has been an assault.”
A spokesperson for the MoJ also confirmed to Full Fact that Hughes had not been attacked.
Many of the posts claim Hughes was attacked in prison by Jordan McCann, a British rapper, who was reportedly in prison as of September 2021, according to Reuters.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because there is no evidence Thomas Hughes has been attacked and left in critical condition.