Whitney Houston's Funeral: Homophobic Picket was Photoshop Fiddle

February 20, 2012 7:27 AM EST

The picture which the Westboro Baptist Church have been accused of photoshopping (twitter)

Picture of funeral scene Westboro Baptist Church accused of altering (Twitter)

The controversial Westboro Baptist Church has been accused of using Photoshop on an image which showed its members protesting at the funeral of Whitney Houston.

The anti-gay group, which is infamous for picketing funerals of military personnel and public figures, threatened to show up at the late singer's funeral in New Jersey.

During the ceremony, Westboro church leader Margie Phelps tweeted a picture which appeared to show members of the group outside the New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, holding up placards with their usual message of "God hates fags", along with "Whitney in hell".

Phelps, daughter of the church's founder, tweeted: "Did my friends @BET see these lovelies? Such fun singing to @OccupyWallSt This picket is rocking the house! @NJ_News"

But the Star Ledger, New Jersey's biggest newspaper, reported that the photo was inaccurate, as the area depicted in it had been blocked off by police.

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The newspaper, which said it had reporters on the scene throughout the day of the funeral, also claimed there were no active protests in the vicinity at any point.

Suspicions that the photograph had been doctored by Photoshop were raised because it had pixels with different resolutions, which means that two separate photographs had been edited together.

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