A broken leg, broken nose and jaw to fake such a thing exhibits a level of commitment rarely seen. I tend to doubt it.
Please read further.
I don't think the fear is that they weren't really beaten up - they clearly were.
The thing you need to be wary of is that they were not quite the innocent victims of the beatdown that the first version of the story would lead you to believe.
To be clear, I am absolutely not implying that that is the case here, but you can get burned reacting to a victim's story only to later find out that there was more to be told about the incident.