Old video of people storming a store in U.S. linked to protests in France

Context

The recent unrest in France following the killing of a teenage boy by a police officer has been accompanied by a surge of misinformation online. Several unrelated videos and pictures have been shared, claiming to show protests that have erupted in different parts of France since the teenager’s death on June 27. One such video shared on Twitter shows a group of people storming into a Louis Vuitton store and looting it. One tweet shared the video with a caption in Spanish, which read, “Vandals loot a Louis Vuitton store in Paris, France.” This post alone had gained over 650,000 views on Twitter at the time of publishing. However, the viral video is not from France.

In Fact

A reverse image search showed us that the video has been online since 2020. The same visuals can be spotted in a video posted by YouTube channel 'Hubert Cumberdale’. This video was posted on May 30, 2020, and was shared with the title, “Portland Riots 2020 - Louis Vuitton Store Looted.” This indicates that the video is not recent but has been online for the past three years. 

US-based freelance journalist Sergio Olmos had also shared an extended version of the video on Twitter on May 30, 2020. Olmos had uploaded a thread of videos documenting the protests in Portland over the death of George Floyd, an African-American man who was killed by a police officer on May 25, 2020. The now-viral video was also part of this thread, and was shared with the caption, “Portland Lou V looted.” Local media outlets widely reported the protests and subsequent storming of stores in Portland. Protests over Floyd’s killing soon spread to other cities in the U.S. and became part of the national discourse.  

Logically Facts also geolocated the Louis Vuitton store on Google Maps and found that it is located inside a shopping mall named Pioneer Place in Portland, Oregon. Google had captured the image on February 2020, and the entrance of the store is the same as seen in the viral video. The brand logo can also be spotted on the left side of the store, just like in the viral video. This confirms the location of the store to be Portland and not France.  

The Verdict

An old video from 2020 that shows a group of people vandalizing a Louis Vuitton store in Portland, U.S., has been falsely shared as footage of recent protests in France. Therefore, we mark the claim false.