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A STORY FROM last year about an elderly woman being abandoned at a fast-food outlet has been reshared by an Irish anti-immigration activist with additional fabricated details.
Both the elderly woman and the person who filmed the footage are described as Irish, while another woman described as a “carer” who had left the older woman alone was described as African.
The new post also neglects to mention the footage was filmed in London and has no apparent connection with Ireland.
“Brave Irishwoman confronts African ‘carer’ who abandoned a 98-year-old Irish woman with dementia,” Niall McConnell posted to Facebook along with a video on 27 April.
The post also contains a link to a petition objecting to plans for what is misleadingly called a “mega mosque” near Letterkenny.
Niall McConnell is a former political candidate and the leader of Síol na hÉireann, an anti-immigration group. Síol na hÉirean is not a registered political party.
The Journal has previously debunked numerous false claims spread by both McConnell and Síol na hÉireann.
McConnell’s post was accompanied by a video in which a woman says she was at a fast food restaurant when she noticed an elderly woman had been left on her own.
The video was originally posted on 23 December 2025 by a social media influencer who goes by Bridgey Barbara. She said that the older woman could barely communicate and so she felt she had to stay to keep an eye on her until the carer returned.
When that woman did return, Bridgey Barbara she confronted her in what erupted into a shouting match in the fast food outlet.
Bridgey Barbara posted an update in the early hours of Christmas Day to say that the family of the elderly woman had since been in contact, that the woman was being looked after, and that they were aware of the video.
However, there are other telling in Bridgey Barbara’s posts that tellingly didn’t make it into McConnell’s. Firstly, the footage was taken at a shopping centre in north-west London, at Smoky Boys, a fast food chain that has no outlets in Ireland.
As such, there is no indication that the elderly woman, who also appears to live in London, is Irish.
Nor is there any indication that the “carer” who left that woman alone is from Africa. The “carer” is Black.
As for the uploader, Bridgey Barbara, her social media shows that she identifies herself as an Irish Traveller, but that she is from and lives in London, not Ireland.
This video is not the only time McConnell has baselessly claimed a person accused of wrongdoing was African.
He previously shared a video on social media alongside a caption claiming that it shows an “African” man assaulting a white woman in Ireland.
“African brutally assaults innocent white girl unprovoked! Separation not integration! Please share to raise awareness!”part of the description read.
The video actually showed an old incident from Missouri in the United States.
The Journal’s FactCheck is a signatory to the International Fact-Checking Network’s Code of Principles. You can read it here. For information on how FactCheck works, what the verdicts mean, and how you can take part, check out our Reader’s Guide here. You can read about the team of editors and reporters who work on the factchecks here.
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