A female cyclist who appeared to have been incessantly harassed by two workmen in a transit van got her own back, by ripping off the vehicle’s wing mirror.
But questions have been raised about footage of the incident, captured on a motorcyclist’s GoPro camera, after a witness claimed to have seen the incident being set-up.
The video, which has now been taken down, was watched millions of times after it was uploaded to Facebook page on Tuesday, but a witness on Wednesday told The Sun he believes he saw the altercation being orchestrated.
The clip was released by Shoreditch-based viral content firm Jungle Creations, which was licensing the video for hundreds of pounds per publisher.
Co-founder Jamie Bolding earlier told The Huffington Post UK, “I can categorically state that we did not make the video”, but would not comment directly on whether the company believes the footage to be genuine.
However, the company’s co-founder Paul Bieboer told the Evening Standard that he “couldn’t verify its authenticity, but we don’t think it’s fake.”
Appearing to distance his firm from the footage, Bieboer also told The Sun its only involvement was in receiving the content.
“We’ve never worked with them before. As a company we’ve known them for a few years but never really licensed videos from them,” he said.
But in a statement on their website released Wednesday evening, Jungle Creations admitted the video may have been “factually incorrect” and announced that it was launching an “internal investigation”.
“We rigorously vet all content received from third parties to ascertain its credibility, but unfortunately our usual high standards were not met on this video,” the statement said.
On the Jungle Creations website, it says the company creates: “Original viral video concepts that are produced by our award winning in-house team. We guarantee clients a minimum of 1 million views on each of these films.”
Builder Scott Deane told The Sun that he saw a man give instructions to the cyclist and the occupants of the van.
“He was telling the girl: ‘You need to ride behind the van aggressively’,” the newspaper reported.
The footage begins after the van pulls up next to the cyclist at a red light on a London street.
The passenger then asks the woman: “Alright, want my number?”
The cyclist seems unimpressed and pushes her hand against the side of the van, which the man says is “not very ladylike”.
He then continues: “What charm school did you go to?”
In a final insult before the light go green, the man adds: “Shut up you old dog, you on your period?”. He then tries to touch her shoulder, as the cyclist makes an ‘up yours’ hand gesture.
The van is then seen disappearing into the distance, but the cyclist doggedly pursues it.
When the van pulls over to the side of the road, the woman stops beside it, and using both arms, tears the wing mirror off, before continuing on her way.
The following motorcyclist then pulls up alongside the van and tells the occupants: “That’s exactly what you deserve, you scum!”
Full Statement From Jungle Creations
It’s come to our attention that a video distributed on our Facebook channel Viral Thread on 21st February 2017 may be factually incorrect. Contrary to reports, we want to make clear that Jungle Creations was in no way involved in the making or production of this video. The video was received from a third-party content provider and was distributed on Viral Thread by Jungle Creations under the impression that it portrayed real-life events. We rigorously vet all content received from third parties to ascertain its credibility, but unfortunately our usual high standards were not met on this video. Jungle Creations is committed to ensuring and protecting the integrity of content on its channels and we take matters of this nature extremely seriously. We have since commenced an internal investigation to ensure that it does not happen again. The video has now been removed from all Jungle Creations social media channels and we wholeheartedly apologise for confusion caused.