Florida Instagram Falsely Suggests Local Reporter Involved in Miami Shooting

A popular Instagram account that routinely aggregates news from local publications without attribution used a photo of a Miami Herald reporter in a post about a Miami Gardens shooting, insinuating that she was somehow involved in the incident.

On Wednesday morning, @alwaysinflorida shared a post with its 218,000 followers about a 25-year-old woman’s arrest after she allegedly tried to kill another woman over a messy love triangle. In the top left corner of the post, the account included a photo of Grethel Aguila, the Miami Herald crime and court reporter who first covered the incident on Monday, September 22. The account seemingly ripped Aguila’s headshot from her bio at the end of the article.

Though the Instagram post did not name Aguila, it wrongly implied that the journalist was either the perpetrator or the victim in this case. The post remained on Instagram for at least an hour.

“Miami Gardens Woman Arrested for Shooting Rival in Love Triangle Disput[e],” the post read.

The caption added, “A 25-year-old woman, Jahniya Imani Meda was arrested in Miami Gardens for attempted murder after shooting her boyfriend’s other girlfriend during a love triangle fight. The victim was shot in the back and buttock but survived. Police say Meda fired from her porch after telling the woman to leave. The shooting was caught on Ring camera, and the gun was recovered. Meda is being held without bond #Alwaysinflorida #aif.”

Two days ago, Aguila wrote an article about the incident titled, “Love triangle leads to woman shooting romantic rival at Miami Gardens home: cops.” All of the information from the Instagram post seemingly comes from Aguila’s reporting. However, the post does not attribute the Herald in any way.

Aguila declined to comment for this story.

The Instagram account deleted the post and posted an apology just after 12:30 p.m. Comments on the post were turned off.

“Earlier this morning we posted a post with some inaccurate information,” the post reads. “We to apologize for the confusion post might have caused. Upon review, we recognize that the information presented was inaccurate, and we take full responsibility for this mistake. Our priority is to ensure that the content we share is reliable and factually correct. We under the importance of maintaining trust with our audience, and we are committed to improving our processes to prevent similar errors in the future. We deeply regret any inconvenience or confusion this may have caused and truly appreciate your understanding as we continue striving to provide accurate and trustworthy information.”

@AlwaysinFlorida is one of many Instagram accounts that lift articles and headlines from local publications like New Times without proper credit. For instance, back in May, New Times reported about how U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained a 44-year-old mother and separated her from her 1-year-old daughter after she was arrested for shoplifting $34 worth of items from Walmart. According to the arrest report, she admitted to stealing the items for her daughter’s first birthday party because she couldn’t afford to pay for them. New Times obtained a photo of the woman from her husband and included it in the story. A day later, @alwaysinflorida posted “Mother Seeking Asylum Jailed by ICE After Shoplifting Baby Supplies” to its Instagram without attributing the information to New Times. The post includes the same photo from New Times’ original story, but does not provide any credit.