Olly Murs has defended himself after claiming on Twitter he heard "gunshots" during a shopping trip at Selfridges on Oxford Street. The Voice UK judge was immediately accused of sparking hysteria with 'fake news' tweets amid the major terror scare in the heart of London on Friday evening. At the time, the Met Police issued a terror alert after hundreds of people began evacuating the nearby tube station. Olly, 33, told his seven million Twitter followers: "[Explicit] everyone get out of Selfridges now gun shots!! I'm inside." He added "Really not sure what’s happened! I'm in the back office... but people screaming and running towards exits!"
After the singer found shelter in a back office, he later confirmed he managed to evacuate to a nearby hotel. "Being told no shots in Selfridges! Have no idea the whole store went crazy," he tweeted. "I'm safe and in hotel with loads of people! So many different stories flying around just hope everyone is safe." The Met Police have since released an official statement saying there were no shots fired. "Officers working with colleagues from British Transport Police carried out an urgent search of the area. No causalities, evidence of any shots fired or any suspects were located by police," they said in a statement.
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Olly was subsequently criticised by Piers Morgan, who wrote: "Stop tweeting mate @ollyofficial. Nothing happened." To which, Olly responded: "Listen piers! I was shopping and then all of sudden the whole place went mad, I mean crazy people running & screaming towards exits. We found a small office to hide to which loads of staff and people were saying there was shots fired. If you was there you'd have understood mate."
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Good Morning Britain's Piers then hit back with: "No. You listen, Olly. When you have millions of followers be very careful what you tweet. There were no shots, in fact nothing happened at all. So you stirred extra needless panic by tweeting false information." Defending himself, Olly wrote: "No you listen Piers.. your comments are unfair mate. It's Easy to say now it was nothing but in a state of shock and panic I was trying to make people aware of what was happening. Which I was lend to believe by staff and customers that someone was shooting." The former X Factor star then addressed his followers with, “Despite what actually happened I’m so glad it was nothing serious and I hope everyone got home safely.”
