UPDATE: After Getting Sued, New York Times Finally Issues Correction on Brandon Darby Article

Alternate headline: NYT Issues Correction After Taking Word of Domestic Terrorist Over FBI Informant

Second alternate headline: How to Get NYT to Correct a Provably False Smear Against an American Patriot: 1) Sue Them…

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Recently Big Journalism called for the New York Times to issue a correction after falsely accusing Brandon Darby of encouraging a leftist terror plot to bomb the 2008 RNC:


Last month, New York Times reporter James C. McKinley Jr. falsely reported that an FBI informant who helped to thwart a left-wing terrorist plot had actually encouraged the conspiracy. In the article “Anarchist Ties Seen in ’08 Bombing of Texas Governor’s Mansion” published February 22, 2011 online and in the print edition a day later, the Times indicated that former left-wing activist and BigGovernment.com contributor Brandon Darby urged two anarchists to firebomb the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota [emphasis added]:

Yet federal agents accused two men from these circles of plotting to make firebombs and hurl them at police cars during the convention. An F.B.I informant from Austin, Brandon Darby, was traveling with the group and told the authorities of the plot, which he had encouraged.

We brought this to your attention on February 24th when we asked the Times to correct the record. We noted that according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota, the assertion Darby “encouraged” the plot was patently false. On February 27th, we brought in Matthew Vadum, an expert on the circumstances surrounding the plot, to provide broader context to the Times’s smear.

Still, the error remained uncorrected.

Then, last week, a source informed BigJournalism.com that the New York Times reporter acknowledged the charge they published against Darby was in fact bogus, but still, the Times did not correct the article.

As of this writing, the false charge against Darby remains in tact.

Today, Brandon Darby filed a lawsuit against New York Times for libel and defamation.

Today the NYT finally issued that correction, perhaps too little too late as Darby already filed suit:

Corrections

Published: March 15, 2011

NATIONAL

An article on Feb. 23 about developments in the investigation of a 2008 arson fire at the Texas governor’s mansion misstated the role played by an F.B.I. informer, Brandon Darby, in an earlier case in Minnesota. In that case, two men were accused of making and possessing gasoline bombs at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul in 2008. Both men eventually pleaded guilty. Initially, however, one of them implicated Mr. Darby, saying Mr. Darby had persuaded him to make the bombs. He later conceded that Mr. Darby had not entrapped him. (Go to Article)

The NYT chose to take the word of a convicted domestic terrorist, David Guy McKay, over an FBI informant who risked his life for the safety of our country.

Do you require any more proof as to the NYT’s bizarre bias? That they would trust and promote the word of an individual who prepared to bomb a public event over that of the man who turned them in to authorities?

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