Why does a broken image shows up even database is empty?

So I am trying to get the photo from the database whenever the user uploaded one. But in my case, even though the user didn't upload a photo nor do not have a a photo saved in the database, a broken image still shows up. I do not know what's wrong with my code but I hope you guys can help me.

Here's my php code:

$img = ['photo'];
    if($img != "") {
        $photo = '/zchs_alumni/news/'.$img;
    echo "<img name='$photo' src='$photo' width='750' height='300' alt='img1'/>";
    }   

Any help?