Failure blamed on journalistic fraud text on Rolling Stone … – Terra Colombia

The School of Journalism at Columbia University said today that a report fraud Rolling Stone about an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia is the result of a “journalistic judgment.”

The magazine published last November 19 article entitled “A rape on campus,” about the increasing sexual violence in US universities, told through the story of an identified student as “Jackie”, who was allegedly raped by seven men at a party in a fraternity, something that has not been confirmed by the evidence found.

After the Washington Post furnish other information that questioned the veracity of the alleged sexual assault, Rolling Stone called independent journalists to study the article, and after the ensuing report, released last night, he retracted Article and apologized to readers and those affected by the case.

As reported today at a press conference at Columbia Journalism School Sheila Coronel and Steve Coll, author of the report along with Derek Kravitz, the error that led Rolling Stone to publish this story was a flaw in the methodology which led those involved to accept history.

The researchers said Rolling Stone not sufficiently contrasted the facts because of the trust for the many years of collaboration between the author of the note, and section editors checking the veracity of the information data.

Moreover, all these departments relied on the reliability of the source, which had been provided by an employee of the university.

“The fault is not in the source, it is a failure of journalism. It is shared between the various people who went through the process,” Coll said, twice Pulitzer Prize in Journalism and dean of Columbia Jornalism School The most recognized journalism school in America.

However, reporters found no evidence to conclude that there was “dishonesty” by Sabrina Rubin Erdely, the author of the note, which works for years with Rolling Stone, and who spent six months to investigate the story of “Jackie”.

“She had great sympathy for victims of sexual violence and thought something had to be done by them. It was moved by the story, and the lack of transparency of the university was another factor,” said Coronel, who said that Erdely “believed in the story until after they published”.

Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity at the University of Virginia, I was talking about the article, announced today that it will take legal action against a Rolling Stone “reckless” publication that attacks its reputation as realized on a statement.

Coll added that one of the reasons that led to failures in history was the resource used by many journalists to find a particular case to tell a whole story.

“It was because of Jackie,” said the journalist, referring to the magazine decided to publish the article even without knowing the identity of the lifeguard who have taken the girl to a party at the pool, where she said the events occurred.