Image of far-right influencer misrepresented as Tumbler Ridge shooter

A host of high-profile social media accounts claim an image of an individual posing with a gun while wearing a pink tank top and red skirt, showing the 18-year-old identified by police as the perpetrator of Canada’s deadliest shooting in decades. But the photo is an edited version of an old photo of Vrillium, a far-right online commentator, who posted on Instagram that he was not the shooter in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia.

“The transgender shooter who murdered 9 people in Canada,” says a February 11, 2026 post on X and Instagram from “@Breaking911,” a widely followed account that AFP has previously verified for spreading false information.

Screenshot of X taken on February 12, 2026

Similar articles are published on X and other platforms, in English and Spanish.

Among those amplifying the image were several prominent right-wing accounts, including anonymous users “@0hour1,” who falsely implicated a Palestinian student in the December 2025 shooting at Brown University, and “@alphafox,” who previously told CNN that he took money from a pro-Kremlin propagandist to spread Russian disinformation about the 2024 U.S. elections.

These messages were published after Canadian police identified, on February 11, 2026, Jesse Van Rootselaar, a transgender woman, as the shooter who opened fire the day before on a school in the isolated mining town of Tumbler Ridge, in the province of British Columbia.

Police said the suspect — who killed his mother and half-brother and shot six others at a school — was a high school dropout who had received multiple visits from law enforcement for mental health issues (archived here). She was found dead at the school from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have not released any official photos of the suspect and have refused to respond to requests to confirm the identities of the individuals appearing in the numerous photos circulating on social media.

But the image of a person brandishing a gun and wearing a pink tank top is unrelated.

Comments on social media linked the photo to Vrillium, a self-described “dirty nationalist” who appears to be linked to the Groypers, a far-right movement affiliated with white supremacist Nick Fuentes.

In a Feb. 11 Instagram story, where his name is listed as William Sexton, Vrillium shared the image and wrote, “This is crazy, I have to say this: no, I’m not Canada’s trans shooter.”

On X, Vrillium further acknowledged that he was the person in the image and responded to some users clarifying that he was “not the shooter.” In an article referencing an American comedian who is often accused of shootings as part of a long-running Internet hoax, Vrillium wrote: “Bro, come on, don’t make me Sam Hyde here.”

AFP requested further comment via an Instagram direct message, but no response was immediately received.

Reverse image searches revealed that earlier versions of the photo had circulated in December 2025 as X users dug up old posts from the X account “@BillySexton2013,” which users connected to Vrillium (archived here and here).

Earlier versions show Vrillium posing differently and holding a guitar rather than a gun. An examination of the “@BillySexton2013” account found the original photo posted in February 2020, in which he was indeed holding a musical instrument (archived here).

Screenshot of X taken on February 12, 2026

When the photo resurfaced in December 2025, Vrillium admitted to

AFP could not determine where the altered version was distorted from after the Tumbler Ridge shooting.

The AFP here has identified another individual falsely linked to the shooting.