Dallas shootings suspect: did police name the wrong man?

POLICE labelled Mark Hughes as the Dallas shootings suspect. His case of mistaken identity has led to him getting death threats.

A MAN who was at the scene of the fatal Dallas shootings has told of how he has received death threats since being incorrectly identified as a suspect.

Police released an image of him, only to cop a backlash on Twitter from people claiming the man was an innocent bystander.

The image shows Hughes walking through the Black Lives Matter protest in downtown Dallas, brazenly carrying what looks like an AK-47.

In the chaotic aftermath of the massacre, the Dallas Police Department hastily tweeted the image of the man, labelling him a “suspect” and urging members of the public to “please help us find him!”.

Hughes told CBS Dallas: “We received a phone call that my face was there on a suspect and I immediately flagged down a police officers.”

He said the news of him being named as one of the suspects was a surprise as he had been “talking to police, laughing and joking with police officers” earlier that day.

This is one of our suspects. Please help us find him! pic.twitter.com/Na5T8ZxSz6

— Dallas Police Depart (@DallasPD) July 8, 2016

Hughes said he was taken in for questioning for around 30 minutes. He was later released without charge.

“Y’all have my faces on national news, are y’all gonna come out and say that this young man had nothing to do with it?” he said. “We’ve been getting death threats.”

“It was persecution on me, unrightly,” he said.

Hughes was photographed with a gun, but friends told CBS Dallas it wasn’t loaded.

Man wrongly labeled as person of interest in #dallaspoliceshooting "I can't believe it.I can't believe it." Via KTVT pic.twitter.com/n37cY7h9hk

— Dr. Seema Yasmin (@DoctorYasmin) July 8, 2016

The brother's name is Mark Hughes. Here are his classmates and his brother. HE WAS NOT THE SHOOTER. A damn mess.https://t.co/pBKAaCu4qI

— Shaun King (@ShaunKing) July 8, 2016

The photograph of Hughes was taken just before two snipers shot 11 police officers, killing at least four, during the protest against the recent fatal police shootings of Alton Sterling in Louisiana and Philando Castile in Minnesota.

But doubts were quickly raised over whether the man was an actual suspect in the horrific killings or was just an innocent bystander caught up in the horror while attending the protest.

The man’s brother, protest organiser Corey Hughes, told CBS his younger sibling was “100 per cent not a suspect”.

Brother of the suspect in the photos talking to CBS 11 in Dallas pic.twitter.com/wiOHua0bjI

— Jon Machota (@jonmachota) July 8, 2016

After police tweeted the offending image, video was posted from the scene showing Hughes calmly walking around a few blocks away from where the carnage took place. The footage appeared to show people in the aftermath of the shootings.

Outraged Twitter users pointed out that footage showed Mr Hughes was not involved in the shootings.

Despite reports that Mark Hughes handed himself into the police to clear up any confusion, the tweet naming him as a suspect remained on the Dallas Police Department’s Twitter account.

Shots fired at #blacklivesmattertx March @dallasnews pic.twitter.com/2TqIQgkXVm

— DMN Photo (@dallasnewsphoto) July 8, 2016