Asked how he felt about the suit when it first hit his desk, attorney Greg Adler said: “Your heart sinks because you just imagine sitting in a restaurant with your family and on the TV screen there’s a news segment playing where they say ‘Allen police have identified the identity of the shooter from the massacre at the Allen mall a couple of days ago, and it’s this person.’ And instead of putting up the real shooter’s picture, they put up your picture.”
All you have to do is imagine that scenario to understand where Mauricio Garcia is coming from with his suit, Adler said.
With help from his attorneys, Mauricio Garcia filed a lawsuit against several media personalities and agencies for misidentifying him as the Allen Premium Outlets mall shooter. The suit alleges he was defamed by the publications and personalities. He's seeking $1 million in damages through the suit.
The suit reads, “In their haste to cash in on the eagerness of viewers and readers to learn the identity of the May 6, 2023 mass shooter at the outlet mall in Allen, Texas, several media organizations recklessly disregarded basic journalistic safeguards and published the photo of an innocent man, branding him as a neo-Nazi murderer to his local community and the nation at large.”
Lawyers Mark Bankston and Greg Adler have filed suit against Fox, Newsmax, TelevisaUnivision, Timcast, Steven Crowder, Owen Shroyer, Simon Ateba and Hollywood Unlocked for misidentifying their client. Their client shares the same first and last name as the shooter, 33-year-old Mauricio Martinez Garcia.
The lawsuit says that on May 6 last year, an individual began shooting visitors at the Allen Premium Outlets mall, killing five adults and three children, and wounding seven others in a matter of minutes. The shooter, Mauricio Martinez Garcia, was a far-right extremist whose online writings echoed white supremacist, neo-Nazi and “incel” ideologies, according to the lawsuit. “Incel” is short for involuntarily celibate.
The shooter committed the massacre while wearing a tactical vest embroidered with the acronym “RWDS,” which stands for Right Wing Death Squad.
No details about the shooter were released on the day of the murders, but several media agencies and personalities tried to identify the suspect the following day using his name and date of birth. The suit alleges that the Fox News website posted an article that recklessly included an image of innocent 36-year-old Mauricio Garcia, identifying him as the shooter.“There was no justifiable reason to use my client’s image as the shooter." – Mark Bankston, attorney
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“There was no justifiable reason to use my client’s image as the shooter,” Bankston wrote on X. “The suit alleges that Fox News failed to exercise reasonable care in verifying the accuracy of the photograph.”
The suit also claims that Mauricio Garcia requested a retraction from Fox within 30 days but that didn’t happen.
Then Shroyer, host of “War Room” on Alex Jones’ conspiracy theory site infowars.com, broadcast an image of Mauricio Garcia, alleging he was the shooter. Shroyer never published a retraction, according to the suit.
Hollywood Unlocked also ran an article portraying Bankston and Adler’s client as the shooter. The media organization failed to publish a retraction within 30 days of Mauricio Garcia's request to do so. Ateba and his media outlet Today’s News Africa, repeatedly published articles featuring images of the innocent Garcia as the shooter as well.
“Again, there was no justifiable basis to use my client’s photograph,” Bankston wrote on X.
Two shows on Newsmax presented extended segments focusing on Mauricio Garcia as the shooter. Newsmax tried to use Mauricio Garcia’s image to suggest the crime was not motivated by neo-Nazisim, according to the suit. “Our client Mauricio is a proud Chicano, and he has classic Dallas lowrider style,” Bankston wrote. “In short, our client does not look like the kind of Mexican American who might identify with white supremacy.” One of the shows also tried to link Bankston and Adler’s client to the prison gang “Puro Tango Blast,” with which he is not affiliated. Newsmax published a retraction before Mauricio Garcia could ask for one.
His photo was also published repeatedly by right-wing media personality Steven Crowder and his company, Louder with Crowder LLC. He, too, tried to use Mauricio Garcia's Chicano appearance to deny the shooter's neo-Nazi motives. Mauricio Garcia demanded a retraction but never got one.
Right-wing media personality Tim Pool’s Timcast Media Group, Inc. repeatedly published photos of Bankston and Adler’s client, portraying him as the shooter. The thumbnail for Pool’s daily show on Youtube included a photo of Mauricio Garcia instead of the actual shooter.
Programs on TelevisaUnivision also showed images of Mauricio Garcia and identified him as the shooter. The station read a correction on air but never ran a retraction.
Many of the media organizations and personalities named in the suit could not be reached for comment, but Adler said he guesses they will likely file motions to dismiss the lawsuit altogether. TelevisaUnivision declined to comment through a spokesperson because the station does not comment on pending litigation.
Adler said these kinds of lawsuits are important “because if somebody doesn’t stand up to them and make them start being diligent and respecting their obligations to get the facts straight before they publish things that can ruin people’s lives, they’ll just keep doing it.”
