By: Joe Strupp It is the kind of internal prank many newsroom staffers have pulled in the past: changing the wording of a story, headline or caption, but without the intention that it run in the paper. Such a change at the North County Times of Escondido, Calif., however, got into the paper and resulted in one editor being fired and another getting suspended.
According to a correction by Editor Kent Davy that ran today, the paper published an Associated Press story on Wednesday about a new Los Angeles law requiring most pet owners to spay or neuter their pets.
But, somewhere along the line, a staffer changed a reference to a councilman's appearance at a related news conference where he "held" a kitten. The North County Times version said he "strangled" the kitten.
"We published a story Wednesday that contained a terrible mistake," Davy's correction began, then later added, "?two of our editors inserted an error into the account that fundamentally mischaracterized a press conference attended by Los Angeles City Councilman Tony Cardenas, one of the law's co-authors. Our Web site, nctimes.com, carries the correct version.
"After conducting an internal investigation, I believe that our editors were not being malicious, furthering some political agenda, or expressing ill will toward Cardenas or anyone else," Davy noted. "Instead, I have concluded that our mistake flowed from a deeply misguided joke that made its way into print. Still, there is nothing more important than running a newspaper that our readers can trust. We have fired the editor who initiated the unfortunate 'joke.' And we have suspended a second editor who failed to keep the error out of print. Further, we will adopt improved quality control measures and training to prevent similar mistakes. ?We apologize to Councilman Cardenas, to the Associated Press and to our readers."
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